Changes Part IV: Priorities and boundaries

In the final post in this series on recent major overhauls to my spiritual life, I will touch upon the change most likely to surprise, confuse, and/or annoy those who are fans of my writing or who know me in some capacity apart from this blog – that of how I handle my current and future priorities and boundaries, which are more closely related and intertwined than many realise.

When I was first figuring things out, after a long time of knowing I have spiritual gifts but not knowing what to do about it, I also wondered if I might be insane, and I desperately needed validation of my experiences.  I made the mistake of sharing too much with too many people and too many of the wrong people.  I found out some of them were completely wrong for that level of trust right away, and others it took longer for their true colors to come through.

There were, however, some people who were a help, and in finding similar perceptions, personal gnosis, and experiences, I decided to start writing to “pay it forward”.  Frey was (and is) also in favor of my writing.  I started my first website in January of 2008 and by December of 2008 I had over 9000 (OVER NINE THOUSAAAAND!) hits, and had received a thousand e-mails from around the world, all but a few extremely positive in tone, thanking me for my work.

Making myself publicly available, however, came with a price.  I got inundated with requests for readings which were expected to be given for free because “you’re supposed to help me”, as well as people who only knew me through my site wanting to be my new BFF, or worse (like the guy who wanted to be my sex slave, saying “you’re Vanic, I know you’ll understand”).

At first, I found it very hard to say no to people (well, except for the creepy random wannabe sex slave dude, since I’m taken and, uh, not into creepy random wannabe sex slave dudes anyway).  However when it got to the point where I was doing 20+ free readings a week and otherwise giving essay-length information on Frey and the other Vanir, in private e-mail to those who needed guidance, for free, in addition to what I had on the site, I started to feel overwhelmed.

I have since my early childhood had a very hard time saying no to people.  For those who don’t know, I am an ACOA (adult children of alcoholics), and ACOAs tend to manifest one of a few personality types: I am the overachiever and people-pleaser.  (And for the LOST fans who read this site, think Jack Shepard, although hopefully to a less obnoxiously emo degree.)

This year, being the year of my Saturn return, taught me a number of tremendously painful lessons, mostly regarding priorities and boundaries.  Ultimately, everything comes back to my desire to please, my difficulties with saying no, or with being able to stick up for myself or raise concern or criticism, waiting until things get past a tolerable point and long past when they should have been addressed.  I have asked myself at different points if my desire to serve Frey as priest comes from a genuine calling or if it is so much of my ACOA dysfunction manifesting as a desire to “be a good girl” and please people.  I’ve had to ask myself in the interests of self-honesty – because Frey deserves that – and sanity.  And I do feel I have a legitimate calling.  However, I know that can be easily warped and distorted by the extant issues, and so even as lining up my external reality with my internal reality is perhaps the most important change to me, as far as the way I deal with others, taking inventory of my priorities and the boundaries in those priorities is foremost.

• The first question in this inventory is Freya’s – What are you worth?

I used to give too freely of my time and my resources to help others.  We live in a society where people don’t think twice about paying for medical or legal help, but think a priest ought to render their services for free because “it’s your job, right?  You’re supposed to help.”  And indeed if someone wants to be a priest to make the big bucks, they are in the wrong fucking profession.  That said, organised religions usually pay their clergy.  Pagan religions (of various flavors, which includes Heathenry) do not.  It is not unheard of for people to charge for readings or rituals, but it tends to get flak.  There comes a time when you cannot be on call 24/7 and give and give and give without some kind of energy exchange.

And so, Freya asks, What are you worth?

The day of me doing free readings is done, unless one of my Gods specifically tells me to waive the fee for someone (and this has happened in the past), but that is rare.  (In the case of personal friends – as opposed to random fans of my writing from the Internet – I have also been known to do barter, such as a reading for a reading, or a reading in exchange for an item of comparable worth, and so on.)

I have, largely due to the economy, set my books at a price for much less than they are actually worth in terms of cost of labor and how much I get compensated by Lulu for said labor.  After Yule, I am raising the prices to what I think is a bit more fair.  (So let that be a message to people who still want to get my books at a low low price.)  Any future books will be straight out of the gate at what I think they’re worth in terms of labor cost, even if people think that’s “steep”.

• The second question in this inventory is Frey’s.  What work is necessary, what recreation is necessary, and what can wait until later?

This year, I released six books.  Granted, I was working on a couple of them through 2008, so it’s not technically six books written in one year.  That said, that’s still a lot, and that’s not counting the essays on this blog, or my personal website, or what I put on the Vanaheim Fellowship site.  Writing will always be a part of my spiritual life, as a form of service to others.  But it doesn’t take the same priority it once did.  If anything, I am restructuring how I think of myself, so I think of myself as something other than “the writer”.  I have a life away from the computer, away from my USB sticks where my documents are saved.  I may put out at least one more book but there is no mad dash to do so, and it is less important than it once was.

I have had a hard time with relaxing, and being able to enjoy myself.  I was always a serious child who preferred to read during recess, and used to lecture my classmates about littering.  I have learned the hard way that I need a certain amount of “unserious business” each day to regulate my stress levels or I completely defeat the purpose of what it is to serve Frey.  He is, as God of the World, a God of everyday life and that which makes life worth living.  He is about the goodstuff on Earth, and forgetting that goodstuff by chaining myself to too much duty and obligation (both mundanely and spiritually) means I lose sight of Him.  So, frivolity and humor are necessary, sometimes.

There are some tasks which are future goals but don’t need to be done right now, and indeed, if done right now means they would either be done sloppily and with high chance of failure (such as, becoming a landowner and building a temple, which needs to happen in stages), or I would burn out (like writing another book right now when my brain needs to recharge).  I’ve also had to sort out “what I’d like to do” v. “what is necessary and part of the Plan”.  This is easier said than done.  Which leads me to:

• Njord’s question of What brings you strife?  What brings you peace?  What is the difference?

Back to the whole duty and obligation makes Siggy a burned out Freyswoman.  I naively used to think frith and peace were the same thing, and that it was good to not rock the boat and “be nice”.  Then I got to know Frey better and found He’s not very nice, sometimes.  This is the God who was entrusted with the best sword in the Worlds and is bad-ass enough to hold His own with an antler.  Frey doesn’t play around.

It is impossible to get through life without conflict here and there.  Some stress and conflict is, in fact, necessary to our personal development.  But there is a fine line between healthy, productive stress, and toxic bullshit where it is no longer worth the time and energy to keep investing oneself into people and projects.  I’ve had more than enough of the latter this year alone to last me nine lifetimes.

This has, for better or worse, made me a bit more hesitant to involve myself with others beyond a very casual level, and dare I say it even a bit curmudgeonly.  While this would ordinarily be problematic for someone in service to a community-oriented God, it is a matter of re-thinking where and how and with who I involve myself.  I can’t change what I am, even for Frey, and the events of the past year alone (never mind similar experiences in the past) have made me… unwilling… to put myself in similar situations in future that are just as toxic if not more so.

I used to think I could change, and that other people’s bullshit would go away if I was more “tolerant” or “understanding”; I wanted to hang in there and give it the good old college try, either because I wanted to “be nice” or I had some fucked-up sense of duty.  I realise now that when things get toxic, it’s not a sign of “weakness” to pull out, but rather a sign of being a healthy, functioning person who still wants their sanity.

And I have to know when that “normal” conflict turns into toxicity.  It’s still a challenge to pinpoint when the transformation happens, although learning to trust my red flags when they go up as opposed to ignoring them for the sake of “being nice” is helpful (because every time I get a red flag about somebody, it’s always for a reason).

• And finally that leaves us with Nerthus’ question: Who will you allow in your inner sanctum?  Who shall not pass?

As mentioned, I used to be a lot more trusting, naively so, both because I needed validation for the woo and because I wanted to “be nice”.  I have now gotten to a place in my spirituality where there is more I don’t share, than what I do.  To be sure, I continue to update this blog and my website with musings, and I enjoy the discussions among the Vanaheim Fellowship, but with the VF folks that’s because I know them reasonably well enough to know where they’re at and what I can share, and I update my sites as a way of “paying it forward”.

Due to too many breaches of confidence both intentional and unintentional, and the resulting time wasted spent doing damage control (because, really, it goes back to “what are you worth?” and my time is not worth that), my personal LiveJournal has largely turned into a repository for cat pictures and recipes.  Gone are the days when I would use LiveJournal as therapy, or thought by virtue of someone having woo or even being in a similar Deity-relationship situation as myself, they would get it and be a support network (or for that matter, where I thought I should “be nice” and “friend” people of reasonably similar interests so they would buy my books).  As the Havamal says (to paraphrase), “if three know, the whole world knows”, so I’m better off keeping spiritual discussions either casual and not super-secret, or drastically limiting who I tell what to.

The realisation that I need to, for my own safety and sanity, keep quiet about most things (if not all) has been disappointing, and at first it was rather lonely.  However as I pulled away from discussing things with people, and reached out more to my Gods and other spirits, I found I’m really not alone after all.  Where I used to need validation, I was by necessity figuring things out for myself, and gaining confidence in my spiritual perceptions, experiences, and skills. I cut my online time in half (and my phone time down even more than that), and spent more time in “real life”.  For all of my feelings of betrayal and hurt when I first began to disengage from discussing my deepest inner workings, I now believe this is one of the healthiest changes I have ever made.  I am a stronger person as a result.

And I have to say that even if the issue of betrayal hadn’t been there, I think (as I have said earlier) that divulging too much information means giving away one’s personal power.  There are some mysteries that should not be shared, there are some mysteries that cannot be shared.  To be too open about too many things is to cheapen a very personal experience.

Plus, not being able to share the TMI of such-and-such weird-ass vision does not mean a person is “not really my friend”.  People have different friends that fulfill different purposes, and degrees of trust.  This seems to be an unwritten social norm for, well, normal people, but is hard for people like me to figure out and is often learned the hard way.  Just because I can discuss very basic Heathen stuff and politics and love of the outdoors with this one friend, but not the TMI-woo, doesn’t make them “not really my friend”, especially when people who have been privy to the TMI-woo have flaked out on me or stabbed me in the back (though not all, thankfully).

~~~

…So, there you have it.  These are the changes I’ve had to make to protect myself.  I may still fumble, sometimes.  I’ve got a lot of issues.  But I’m willing to own my shit, and to use it as fertiliser for my life, rather than wallowing in it or throwing it at other people.   That’s what Freyfolk do.  And if you’ve gotten anything out of this, whether you are having similar issues and know you’re not alone and have some encouragement as where to start, or you’re inspired to work on other areas of your own development, I thank you for reading and rock on.

Changes Part III: Internal and external reality

There was a time, several years ago, before my life fell apart, where my spiritual practice was highly disciplined.  I had daily, weekly, and monthly practices.  Granted, the primary Deities and operating paradigm was quite a bit different, but it gave me a reserve of personal power that really helped in my day-to-day life.  It was when I started doubting, and started fearing, and my practice fell by the wayside, that things got nasty.

I am in a position now where my life has been rebuilt to the point that unless I were to disclose to you everything that happened, you would never know that everyone around me thought I’d be dead by age 30.  It has not been an easy transition living hand-to-mouth, to having multiple responsibilities, and having to take care of myself well enough to do them, which means getting myself out of survival mode autopilot and doing things I once thought were luxuries for other people… you know, things like eating three meals a day.  But, my life is pretty normal.  The thing that has been the hardest to reinstate, not surprisingly, is the spiritual practice.

Again, the way my spiritual practice looked then, as compared to now, is quite different.  Freya and Woden were my closest Deities then, Frey and Nerthus are now.  I was a lot more magic-dependent then, I am a lot more prayer- and meditation-dependent now.  My energy has changed, and what I do with that alignment of energy is changing as needs must.  But I do best with consistent daily, weekly, and monthly practices of varying kinds, which helps keep me grounded, and is continual nourishment for my soul.

The thing I repeatedly struggled with was internal and external reality.  By this I mean, having a basic idea of what I should be doing or would like to be doing, versus how that actually manifested in my actions.  The reason why the Anglo-Saxon maxim is “You are your deeds” and not “As a man thinketh, so he is” is because you can have all the good intentions in the world and if you’re not doing anything with them, they’re just thoughts, doing nothing.  For all of my good intentions as far as what I thought my practice should consist of, I had a Hel of a time trying to go about it.

The first big stumbling block was trying to separate the “what I need” from “what I want”, separating the “what I should do” versus “what I think I should be doing”.  There is a lot of stuff that I have long thought I should be doing or I am Doing It Wrong (TM), and so I had to sit down and sort out what I think a proper Frey-priest should do, what I am able to do with my life circumstances and schedule being what they are, and how I can modify certain things.

The second big stumbling block was that at one time, I was a lot less spiritually self-sufficient than I am now.  For a couple of years, I had a few spiritual “advisors” who thought my spiritual expression should look a certain way.  When it came time for the really bad advice, I stopped listening, and then started questioning and pulled completely away, but even the half-bad advice was bad enough that it set me back from what I was, in fact, supposed to be doing.

Between those two things, I used to get so caught up in self-defeating thought loops of “I can’t do it right” that I wouldn’t do anything.  And though I’m of the opinion that it is better not to do ritual than to do it wrongly, including with the wrong spirit, I also am one of those people who needs certain things at a regular time.  One calls it OCD, one calls it devotion, I just think of it as personal needs and your mileage may vary.  So, needless to say, feeling so much like fail that nothing would happen, stopped being an acceptable option when I’d get further and further behind, especially when one of my favorite holydays would be coming up and I’d have a brain fart trying to figure out where to begin with preparations.

My ideal, as a Frey-priest, would be to be a landowner, with a temple raised to Him, and a God-pole.  This is on my “to-do” list but is not going to happen for at least another five years.  In the meantime, I have a home, with a ritual room dedicated to the Gods, and His shrine in the living room.  So I do what I would be doing there, here, with what I’ve got.

At some point I had to get over my fear (yes, fear) of speaking to the Gods.  This sounds silly, especially when you consider my verbosity online, but in person I’m not a big talker – I’m the quiet type.  I’m not a phone person, and people who do call me tend to do most of the talking.  There are people who have seen this and wondered if I was capable of leading ritual, to attend one of my rituals and be blown away at the execution (at the risk of tooting mine own lur here).  But, even though I know I’m capable of “getting into the zone”, I still sometimes get cold feet about approaching the Gods, because it’s the Gods.  For all of the spooky that goes on in my life, I don’t have that casual relationship where I can just be like, “Hey Woden, how’s it hangin,” and feel particularly good about it.

But, I have managed to overcome that sufficiently to do my morning devotional where I hail all of the Gods.  This is important to me, in my role as temple-keeper, to acknowledge the friends and family of Frey, and Their part in the workings of the world.  I give Frey a lot of my time and attention, but I’m not a henotheist.

The internal and external reality issue has naturally carried over into more formal rituals.  As I’ve re-tooled my ritual calendar, that should give me more to work with in terms of preparation and resources, to make each one really good.  Just because it’s not a real swine blot doesn’t mean it shouldn’t happen.

The internal and external reality issue doesn’t just stop at religious practices, however.  It also affects how I see myself v. the kind of person I would like to be, what I am doing with my life v. what I want to do or think I should do, and even small things like my appearance, the way I carry myself, habits, hobbies, etc.  These are all things that individually may seem self-absorbed and trivial, but the whole is equal to the sum of its parts, and if one part is “off” it tends to throw everything off.  If I can’t meet my exact ideal, I need to acknowledge that such is either realistically impossible for me (such as, being a size 6), or do what I can with what I have (with clothing, modifying habits), or work towards the ideal by degrees (hobbies, life goals).

Frey is a God of integrity, and I owe it to Him to be true to myself – to tend my own fields, and make sure they produce, before I worry about fertilising others’.  I am getting a lot better with this, but the very first step was acknowledging there was a problem to begin with.  A lot of us, especially mystics of various persuasions, are afraid to admit when things might be “off”, because we either go telling everyone and they want to make suggestions or accuse us of being impious, or we start to think we fail and are failing at other things too.  I have come a long way from where I was even three years ago, but I will never get to where I want to be if I don’t acknowledge that and work towards it, and if I’m hindered by feeling bad enough about things I can’t change that I give up and make no effort at all.

Out of all the changes I’ve made, this is perhaps the most important one because it affects me at different levels, and in the great web of Wyrd, that affects those around me (I like to call them hapless bystanders).  I write this in the hopes of encouraging those who might struggle with the same thing.

Changes Part II: Community and where I belong

In the past, I have spoken of the fact that most people who have a calling on their lives, are bound to serve a community.  I largely still think this is true, and stand by what I wrote in Wyrdness: Mysticism in Modern Heathenry on the issue.  However, some months after finishing that book, and in the wake of some external changes that have prompted internal adjustments and re-tooling, I would like to elaborate on this a bit, including making some clarifications if I may.

Let me start off by saying there is nothing wrong with being a solitary, and indeed some of us will be solitaries for various reasons.  Contrary to the critics of a solitary Heathen path, being a solitary does not automatically mean one is too lazy to find other Heathens or is lacking something in their spiritual fulfillment.  Most of the people I know who are solitary have either been burned by group involvements or know themselves well enough to know they’re not a joiner and joining a group will not end well.  I think this level of self-honesty deserves some respect.  Finally, while community can add to a person’s experience, all communities are comprised of individuals and every community is only as strong as its weakest member’s individual, personal study, practice, and motivation for doing so.

But, the fact remains, most mystics are obligated to use their skills in service, and by virtue of being mystical we find it harder than most people to fit in anywhere.

The recurring theme behind all these changes I am making, and sharing with my readership, is that of prioritizing, and being discriminating in one’s priorities.  The lesson that has been drilled into my head in this year of my Saturn return is that the need to belong and be validated is not wrong in and of itself – it is an essential part of the human condition.  But it is far better to forge one’s own path and be seen as a little odd for going in a different direction, than go down a road you’re not meant to be on.

Like many Heathens and Pagans, I bought into the idea that in order to “do it right” as far as involvement with other Heathens and Pagans, it was necessary to belong to an umbrella organization and at a local level be a community organizer on the “scene Pagan” circuit.

Even though I know intellectually that there is something to be said about quality over quantity, and I have little time to waste doing damage control of various sorts, I still thought if I avoided the really obviously mainstream groups and the idea of the party Kindred and just did something “different”, that it would work out.  The problem is, even if something is presented as an “alternative”, if it is based on the status quo, it is still inherently problematic in its structure for those who need an alternative.  For some people, they may thrive in the status quo, and that’s OK.  For people like myself, my goals and agendas are often very different from most people’s, and that can be a fatal error when mixed with those who are not remotely on the same wavelength (which doesn’t make them wrong or bad, just different and incompatibly so).  And trying to change myself and my needs to conform has a tendency of not working out so well and smacking me upside the head, painfully, later on.

Like many mystics, I wanted to have a support system of other woo-people.  I thought if I avoided the extremes of people in abusive Deity relationships or people who are drunk on their own power, that I could make something work.  I was wrong there, too.

I have reached the conclusion that mystics are not meant to travel in packs.  And it’s not that not enough people engaged in mystical or shamanic practices aren’t talking about them.  There are plenty of people who are, and very publicly.  However – just like the seidh-workers in the Sagas were often working magic against each other, and there are accounts of tribal shamans also engaged in psychic warfare with rivals, I believe there is historical precedence for why it doesn’t work and those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.

I do indeed have a couple of close friends of a woo persuasion who I am OK with sharing certain things with, for reality checks or some encouragement.  But I no longer have hope that there can be some kind of support group for woo-people.  It’s not meant to work that way.  Sharing certain things with too many people not only takes away from one’s personal power, it can make one more vulnerable to attack (whether verbal or otherwise) when inevitably someone compares themselves to you and wants to be what you are or wants to have what you have – or you find out how nuts someone really is (as is too often the case with mystics or those who appear to be) and calling wingnuttery to concern is an unpopular opinion that makes you a target.

We must all figure out our Wyrd for ourselves, and frankly people who are too highly dependent on validation from others to preserve their own sanity are probably too weak to be in this business.  (This is not to say needing validation at all, or even often, is wrong, just that if you are basing the majority of your religious experience on guidance and approval from others, there is something that needs to be addressed.)

So, what does this all mean?  It means that though I am supposed to be serving other people, the way that is meant to look is different from what is considered the norm.  I am not interested in joining another organization or attempting to recruit people to do things with.  But contrary to popular opinion there is a happy medium between being completely solitary and isolated, and being a scene Pagan involved in multiple groups whose entire life revolves around the social aspect of religion.

I have, as mentioned, a couple of close friends who are mystical, who I share things with.

I have Vanaheim Fellowship, which is a special-interest devotional fellowship, and as such has kept on focus and has provided me with food for thought, and contact with some real cool folks.

I have my local group, which has become much more tribalist in nature, and more highly structured as a result, and thus is very restrictive on who we let join.

I have clients who come to me for help.  Like Frey’s priestess of old, people can come find me at the temple if they have need of my services.  The only time when I should, and will, go out of my way to deal with the greater public, at this point, is once a year at His wain procession, where His blessings can be given to all who show up to pay Him respect.

And that is where I’m at with community and where I belong.  I started off in Heathenry nine years ago with a lot of wide-eyed optimism, thinking the first other person I saw with a hammer around their neck would be my new BFF.  I now realise that is naive at best, and destructive to myself and hapless bystanders at worst. What I have going may seem like I’m “doing it wrong” and “not trying hard enough” to some, folks who haven’t walked a mile in my shoes and don’t know how many false starts and trials it took before I figured out what was hurting me and holding me back.  What I have going is good enough for me now, it is fulfilling – it may not be enough for some, but I am not them.

I know there are people who will read this and be angry that I am challenging the status quo especially if it works for them.  But I’m only challenging it for myself.  I can’t tell any of my readers what to do for themselves, other than strongly advise them to, as always, question everything – what you do and why you do it, and especially when other people are involved who might get hurt.  If you are meant to be in service to other people, you will eventually figure things out with how to go about that and where to fit in.  If not, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise or that you’re somehow doing it wrong.  For them, that may well be – for you, not necessarily.

Thanks for reading.

Changes Part I: My Ritual Calendar

As mentioned in a recent post, I have gained a lot of clarity with regards to my religious direction.  I’ve known for some time that I am different and have a calling, but have had difficulty with figuring out how to put that into action, so even as I’ve had some uncomfortable adjustments and realisations, I also know I am now on the right track with doing as needs must.

With clarity comes yet more changes, which I feel pertinent to share with my audience both in the interest of honesty and transparency, and in the hopes of helping if one can benefit from what they read.

Some of you may have seen a post about Hel, on Hallows, and may be wondering what happened to it.  I did post it, it is gone now.  It isn’t because I’ve changed my mind on how I feel about Hel, but because Hallows was rather disappointing at multiple levels.  However there was some usefulness to observing it, and that was to finally decide once and for all to revise my ritual calendar.

While I do still believe “you are your deeds”, not your intent or your headspace, and it is the act of doing ritual and doing the right thing that matters more than the grand epiphanies and “woo”-rush, I also believe that it is better to not do ritual than do it wrong.  What is doing it wrong?  Doing it with a spirit of drudgery and grudging obligation, doing it half-assedly because your heart really isn’t in it.

I have never been able to “get” Hallows, and thought I still might do it because it was “the right thing to do”.  However doing it, and doing it in the wrong spirit, finally made me confront that big pink elephant in the room – how much of what I do is because I feel obligated to do it, and how much of it is actually necessary?

I feel like a fraud doing a holiday based on connecting with (and hoping for visitations by) the ancestors when I know for a fact I’m headblind with the dead and I give the ancestors honor every day, not just on Hallows.

As has been mentioned perhaps to excess, I’m not a fall person.  That said, even if I liked fall better, I have for the past three years lived in (what I call) The Land Without Spring and Fall.  You see, if I am truly a Heathen – a heath-dweller – and if I am truly a priest of Frey, God of the World, and a devotee of His mother who is the Land Herself, then I need to base my cosmology on the land where I live.

I am not going to offend the Gods by not observing the Generic Neopagan Wheel of the Year. The Icelanders only had three holydays, based on their seasonal changes. I don’t practice Icelandic Asatru, and go by the Anglo-Saxon model, for which we have some clear holytide observances (Solmonath, Eostremonath, Hrethemonath, Haligmonath, Blotmonath) and then English folk customs such as the Maypole, Lammas observances, etc. However – the Anglo-Saxon and English folk model is based on (you guessed it) the way the seasons change in England. I may be speaking English, but I don’t live in England, I live in Southern California.  The holidays known to the Germanic tribes were based on the way the land changed with the seasons.  Ergo, where I am living now, there are some holidays that are… irrelevant in context.

So as of now, I am eliminating Hallows, Ewemeolc (Charming of the Plough), Eostre, and Harvest from my high holy days schedule, but keeping Yule, May Day, Midsummer, and Lammas.  Why am I keeping those four, you might ask?

Yule is traditionally about the return of the Sun, and the promise that even in the dead of winter, the days will eventually grow longer and give way to spring.  Where I live, Yule is about mild weather, sometimes rain, but a time where instead of drought and fire, the Land is nourished, and regenerates.  It is still about rebirth, but in a different way.

At May Day, there are many baby animals out and about – birds, lizards, squirrels, kittens.  My garden is blooming, and you can feel the power of fertility in the air.

The holiday of Midsummer traditionally celebrates the longest day of the year and the life-giving power of the Sun, and often with festivities such as a bonfire.  Where I live, I like to celebrate Midsummer at the ocean, rather than in front of a bonfire.  But it’s still a reminder that the Sun does good things – in this case it makes the ocean warm enough to be comfortable, and certain local fruits and vegetables are in season.

I honor Lammas as the day when Frey is sacrificed each year, His life given to the land in exchange for taking up the harvest, a gift for a gift.  The death sting of Lammas is especially felt where I live, as there is high heat, often drought and fires.  Frey dies so the land may live, sacrificed to feed the land and protect it against disaster.

I see no point in celebrating the four I am dropping because they are not relevant to the seasonal changes here.  (Before anyone mentions Dia De Los Muertos, let me state for the record that I am not a culture vulture and have no business appropriating a Mexican holiday.  And no, they are not “the same thing”.)  Plus, Ewemeolc falls around my birthday and within days of my anniversary of my vows to Ing, so it seems kind of superfluous to have a high holy day then too.

I might also add that dropping the spring and fall holidays does not mean my religious life will completely disappear during those times.  As part of my extant ritual calendar, the following are regularly occurrences:

Daily – I have a devotional practice in the morning where I open up the ritual room, ask for my ancestors’ blessing and thank them for giving me life, do a “roll call” of the Gods, and proceed to Frey’s altar where I hail Him, offer the day to Him, and pull a rune.  In the evening I set aside some time for meditation.

Weekly – At differing times during the week, but generally not more than once a week, I offer to my house-wight, and have an “appointment” with Nerthus.

Monthly – Faining to land-wights on the new moon, and húsel (sacred feast) in Ingui’s honor on the full moon.

So, with four high holy days and daily, weekly, and monthly practices that I get a lot out of, it finally feels right, as opposed to “this is what I think I should be doing but why does it feel off”.

I encourage and challenge my readership to examine what holytides are relevant and meaningful to them, and why.  To see what can be cut out without doing damage, and what new things can be added to feed one’s soul.  To take a look at the land where you live – not where the ancient Germanic or Celtic tribes lived (although obviously if you live there, that’s awesome and I envy you) – but where you are, and how the seasons and terrain are different and if there is any overlap with the “traditional” seasonal changes.  Live with the Land, because it is from Her we come, and it is to Her everything will return, and we at least owe Her that.

The wind beneath my wings

So now that I’ve made you throw up a little, I’d like to take a moment out and say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my life partner and favorite evil Scorpio, Eosin.

Let me start off by saying we also recently celebrated our three-year anniversary.  We have had our ups and downs, but we’ve made it, and I am glad to have him.

For all of the work that I do in Frey’s service – writing, giving rede to clients, community organizing, and my own personal spiritual maintenance – it would be a lot harder to do it without the support of my partner.  Not only is he a co-religionist (and a fellow devotee of the Hlaford) but he gets it.

If I share an insight, precog, or dreamvision with him, he doesn’t dismiss it, but listens and helps with reality checks including confirmations.  If I get woken up at three in the morning by angry land-wights (this hasn’t happened in awhile, thankfully), he doesn’t tell me “Go back to bed, dammit”.  If I need to get a special offering for one of the Gods or wights, he helps.  Ditto with rituals.  He is my “spotter” when I do heavy seership.  All of this, and thankfully he doesn’t have the same “ethernet connection to Vanaheim” which makes living my life very interesting (it would be hard to live with another person experiencing that same level of “woo”).

I have practiced solitary, and see nothing wrong with a solitary path in and of itself, but it is nice to have someone to celebrate the high holy days and the moontides with, someone to pray with, someone who gives encouragement and even inspiration when I need it.  I like doing things as a household, rather than having to rely solely on myself (introverted though I may be).  Indeed, as one who is in service to a community-oriented Deity, I like not being allowed to hermit too deeply, and being reminded that some people don’t in fact suck.

So if you get anything out of my writings at all, I would like you to know that none of this would be possible without the help of the partner Frey brought into my life three years ago, for which I thank Him every day.

Happy birthday, my love.

Nerthus

My first encounter with Hertha, or Nerthus as She is more commonly known, came during the visionary experience when I oathed to Frey, in 2004.  I had to be both in this world and Vanaheim, to “do it properly” before His family.  Nerthus appeared as a very large woman, with a Venus-of-Willendorf type figure, and veiled.  Anytime I would see Nerthus after that, in a visionary experience, She was veiled.  When I moved out to Southern California, She allowed me to see Her face.

I began working closely with Nerthus in the summer of 2008; She began showing up in my dreams, where I would see visions of the rites of Her cult in the old days, or the history of the Vanir, or She would give instruction on things such as magic and personal self-care.  She made it clear that She had a claim on me and I would serve Her as attending priest, with my relationship with Frey being secondary and as a support; this would be reinforced by periodic dreams of such shiny fun things as being drowned in Her bog as a sacrifice, to remind me of keeping my priorities in order and being accountable to Her.

Now, 2008 was a very difficult year for me between interpersonal conflicts with family and friends, a move, and the physical and mental fallout of being attacked by Heathen seidh-workers who disapproved of my “heresy” and wanted to shut me down (and rather than this being a silly paranoia made up out of the sky, I have testimony from reliable sources as to the dates and persons involved).  The problems of “mundane” life got to be enough where I had a very hard time keeping up with Nerthus’ teachings and regimen, and a week before Hallows 2008, She let me go.

I was both relieved and deeply ashamed, as I felt that I had failed Her.  I did not realize at the time that She was testing me, which I found out much later – it had been so long since She’d had a human attendant, that She went to one who was the most open to Her out of what She had to choose from at that time (there seems to be a shortage of Vanic people), to see what a priest of Hers in this modern day (“when you children of men are weak”, She said) could and could not handle and still survive.  About a month after She let me go, She claimed a very dear friend of mine, and I was, indeed, afraid for what would happen to my friend, and proceeded to give him a crash course on being new to the Vanir Gods and Vanic side of Heathenry, as best as I could.  For all of my initial fears and worries I have to say in all sincerity that to see him today, you would never know he didn’t initially start off on a Vanic path (or even a Germanic path for that matter), and in many ways he outshines his teacher and I am exceptionally proud of him.  He will be a very good priest of Nerthus.

Meanwhile, even though I was free of “Nerself”, that didn’t make things any easier – more changes and upheavals happened in my life, some of them good as they were a catalyst for necessary change, but some – mostly involving Pagan and Heathen group dynamics, and politics and drama therein – left very large, ugly scars and deep, festering wounds on my psyche.

In October of 2009 – two weeks shy of the one-year anniversary of Her releasing me – I came to a crossroads where I knew I had a vocation, but was unsure how to go about it, and while my fulltrui Frey was very helpful, I needed a little extra help.  Nerthus came back to me, and told me “We need to finish what we started in you.”  I had a dream where She dismembered me, ate my limbs, and then regurgitated me into Her cauldron, mixing me together with some herbs and other items, and dumped me onto the floor.  However, rather than this being a horrible, terrifying experience, it was actually exhilirating, and I realized at that point I was absolutely ready to do what They asked of me, to give my entire life in service rather than parts of it (and especially if I was fooling even myself into thinking I was giving it all over), to trust Them to guide me – as opposed to asking for the approval or advice of others based on what they thought my service to the Gods should or shouldn’t look like.

That said, rather than Nerthus taking the central role She had before, She acknowledged me as Frey’s priest – not Hers – and said I would serve Him, keeping His temple, guiding and inspiring His folc, and doing His procession each year.  She said that my work with Her would be internal, so that way my external service to Frey is the best it can be. She exhorted me to visit Her once a week – to keep a weekly appointment with Her that could only be broken in the case of an emergency – to share herbal tea with Her and go over my inner workings, and what helps and hinders my development as a priestess, and as a person.  Nerthus was much more gentle than before – kind and warm, maternal even – and it surprised me; if anything it terrified me more than Her obvious devouring death face.  But Her gentleness was sincere, and I had to get past the fearsome side of Her and learn to respect Her, before I could see Her softer side.

I am glad to have Hertha back in my life.  The fact is, the Gods don’t have to show up just because we call Them; though They have interest and investment in what goes on in Middle-Earth, They are not obligated to interact with us or do anything with us, and communing with Them is a privilege, not a right.  I am honored that Hertha wanted to reconnect with me, to re-establish a relationship, and I am glad She wants to help me be the best priestess of Frey that I can be, and be my best self.  I am in awe of Her terrible side as well as Her gentle side – both are beautiful to me.  She is holiness, personified, and I am proud to know Her and to work with Her, even as I am aware it will be a lot of work, it will push me yet further past my comfort zones in the process of weorthende - worthing, or becoming.  I am prepared for it, though, and to catch a glimpse of Her beauty and power – to have the privilege of Her presence – She is worth it, in the end.

The path ahead

In the wake of recent changes both major and minor, I’ve had some moments of discomfort and even anguish – but I’ve also had a lot of clarity, and now the feeling of “coming home”.

Rather than reconstructing my Heathen experience based on what I think Bjorn Average (or in my case, Thordis Average) would have looked like in outlook, practice, and daily life, I admittedly draw a lot of my inspiration from the account of Frey’s priestess in Gunnar Helming’s Saga, because whether I like it or not, I am different and have to dance to the beat of a different drummer.  Admittedly there is a lot about this account to be desired, and it raises more questions than answers.  But it’s somewhere to start.

What do we know about this woman?

-We know that she owned His temple.

-We can infer from accounts of other temples what the temple might have looked like – if it was one of the major ones, there would have been images of all the Gods, with Frey’s figure being primary and getting most of the offerings, it belonging to Him, but nonetheless, major temple would have a space for the other major Gods.

-We can infer that apparently people came to her at the temple if they needed help with something.

-We can infer from accounts of other Godhar that she probably performed the blots for the community on the high holy days at her temple, but that would mean others actually traveling to the temple and going to her.

-She did Frey’s wain procession once a year. We can infer from Tacitus’ account of Nerthus’ wain procession that this involved feasting and celebration, where the wain would go.  This seems to be the only major interaction the priestess had where she actually went out into the people, rather than them going to her.

These are all very good points, and have given me some food for thought and great inspiration.  To help with the final process of sorting things out, and because I’m an uber-geek who finds these things useful and fun, I created a Venn diagram to illustrate my spiritual vocation.

There are three major components of my spiritual vocation, as well as four smaller parts, which overlap.

The first sphere is labeled “Temple Keeper” and I put it in blue as it’s more of an internal, private thing.  My home is dedicated to Frey, complete with an entire room for shrines and ritual use, and I have had people from around the world send gifts to put on the Gods’ shrines, and make use of them.  I have a daily devotional and meditation practice which has helped keep me grounded and sane.  I will eventually be raising a proper hóf to Frey with God-poles, but this will be in about 5-6 years… not now (it is, however, in the active planning stages).

For all effective purposes, “Temple Keeper” also includes the private celebrations had with my religious congregation Wessex Folc (as opposed to public ritual), and includes service to clients who seek me out directly for things such as divination and officiating at rites of passage, etc.

The second major sphere is labeled “Hlæfmass Procession” and is in red due to being a dynamic, action-oriented thing.  Frey had a yearly procession in antiquity, and from me He will be getting a public rite each year at Hlæfmass (Lammas), where His wain will go forth and others can pay Him respects and be blessed by Him if it is right for Him to do so.

The third major sphere is labeled “Vanaheim Fellowship” and is in yellow, or gold if you prefer, due to being a resource and a place of joy and healing.

Vanaheim Fellowship is a devotional community dedicated to the honor of the Vanir Gods and exploration of the Vanir cultus.  We are not now, nor will we ever be, a national organization.  Membership in the Fellowship is by invite only and limited to a select few, to keep it on-focus.  So far we have been having some really productive discussion, which has been spiritually inspiring and has given me a sense of belonging that I haven’t felt in just about ever (as opposed to a “near fit” where I ignored the slight twinges of discomfort shoehorning myself into someone else’s paradigm).  Besides the benefit to our own membership, we provide information for the general public on the Vanir Gods and Vanic side of Heathenism, and we also hope to set a trend in encouraging others to create their own small special-interest communities (rather than feeling hurt that they’re not invited to the party).

The first of the four minor spheres is “Wight-Whisperer”, which is between Vanaheim Fellowship and Temple Keeper because it has elements both of being an internal, private practice (work with my own local wights) as well as being a public resource (educating people on relations with their own land-spirits, and helping directly when possible).  It is green because of the obvious connection with greenwights.

The second is writing, which is orange for being action-oriented and is between Vanaheim Fellowship and Hlæfmass Procession because it is something I do strictly for the public, to provide information and inspiration as people can get it from my work.  It is not one of the major spheres because it no longer has the importance in my life it once did.

The third minor sphere is gealdor, which is purple for being magical, and is between Temple Keeper and Hlæfmass Procession as it ties both together.  It is the art of invocation to get the attention of the Gods and other spirits, as well as spellsinging to affect change – as above, so below; as within, so without.  Even if I am no longer in an official drýmann training program, I am still continuing in my studies and practice to refine and perfect my craft.  That is, after all, what witchcraft is – the craft of the wise.

The last of the minor spheres is seership, which is grey because it combines the colors and influence of all of the other spheres, and is the most nebulous and liminal of what I do.  It is also in the center, for it is what I See that guides me to what I Do.  If there was no Seeing, there would be no Doing.  Sometimes I See for others, and sometimes I See for my own ends.  But it was with me first, and everything else has built up around it.

A couple of final notes: I know there are a lot of Pagans who are not into labeling stuff, and feel themselves beyond labels.  I grok that for some people, perseverating too much about semantics is counter-productive.  For people like myself, labeling and categorizing is necessary even when the labels fall somewhat short.  That is how I think – how I am wired to think.  Doing is of course more important than talking about doing or labeling it, but I am one of those people who has a hard time doing if I don’t know what I’m doing.  That, folks, is called “being an INTJ”. 

Finally, while I have much in common with other “woo” people in my acquaintance, I refer to myself as a priest and not a shamanist or spirit-worker.  To me, shamanist and priest are two different things, albeit with overlap in some areas. A shamanist serves a host of Gods and/or spirits, and often has to travel with and interact with the denizens of the Otherworlds to help their client/s in this world; they do a lot of “spooky” like curse-breaking, luck-working, soul-retrieval, healing, etc. A priest is generally in service to a God with perhaps others by extension, and their duties are primarily to facilitate communion between Gods and man, both at rituals involving a community (even if that community is not human, if you catch my drift), and (sometimes) with guiding/inspiring/counseling individuals.

And that, folks, is what I’m doing… what I will be doing.  There have been some false starts, as well as some lessons I needed to learn that I could only get through certain venues.  And now I’m on the right path – on a wain which is my home, and one that I have opened to Ingui.  The journey promises to be interesting, and I will keep you posted.