This is a post written in response to those who condemn petitionary prayer as a way of making oneself feel better about things without actually working to change them, a doing-something flavoured way of not doing anything. There's a general tendency to cast users of petitionary prayer as deluded and smug, doing nothing but sitting back and talking to their imaginary friends while other people do all the real work.

Sometimes you're confronted with an ill in the world and you wish to respond. Perhaps a friend is very sick; perhaps news has just reached you of some calamity occuring elsewhere in the world; perhaps you see a grave wrong being done to some person or group. You wish you could intervene, but what can you do?

Here's what happens if I don't pray:

Oh no, how awful, and I can't do anything! I don't have a cure for [disease]; I don't have the £1000 fee a volunteer agency wants to send me out to help in [location]; I can't oust [political leader]; I'm just one person; I don't have any resources: I don't have any relevant skills; I'm so useless...

...and so on and so forth, until I'm thoroughly eaten up with self-involved despair.


And now here's what happens when I pray:

Oh no, how awful, and I can't do anything! Ah well, at least I can pray. *closes eyes for a few moments, communes with Gods/spirits/aliens/figments of own deranged imagination/what-you-will* Ah, well, I can't cure [disease], but I might be able to chip in for for my friend's doctor-money bleg, or at least send a kind word hir way. I can't afford to go and volunteer in [location], but hey, here's an online project to collect information on survivours and get news to their families. Ah, here's a charity appealing for items of warm clothing--I'll get those jumpers I don't wear anymore out of the cupboard. I can't oust [political leader], but I can go and see if there's an Amnesty International campaign I can participate in. Oh, and here's a reputable relief organisation that takes credit card donations...

Sometimes I get input which I interpret as advice coming from my Gods or ancestors. Sometimes I don't really "get" anything, but the act of directing my intent in a positive way gives me space to order my thoughts and breaks the spell of the despair before it can get a good toehold. Even if no immediate, direct response presents itself, the simple fact that you have approached the situation from the perspective of someone for whom meaningful (if slight) intervention is possible means that you are more open to any mundane strategies that might emerge later on.

Of course it would be better if I could just pull myself up by my bootstraps and get that positive head on by myself, but for reasons beyond my control that isn't possible. Even if there really is no-one on the other end of the phone, prayer still helps.

I was hoping to get into some of the recent topics in more depth today--especially the topic of spiritual abuse etc--but I'm basically just too sick at the moment. A variety of factors seem to have precipitated a crash in my mood, and all I can really think about is the symptoms. So I'm going to write about the depression. ( Read more... )

There's a lot of confusion surrounding this term, which I'm hoping to help clear up.

Some people see the term "Spirit-worker" being used in a book or two, and assume it was invented by that author and refers only to the set of practices in those books. In fact it's a very common term that has been in use for quite some time, and has a lot of applications. It does pretty much what it says on the tin: a steel-worker works with steel, a social worker works with social issues, a sex-worker works with sex and a spirit-worker works with spirits. ("Spirits" in this context could include any sort of non-corporeal being from a God on down, including animal spirits, ancestors, trolls, fae, house-wights, etc.)

Implied also is a sense that this is the practitioner's primary focus--other forms of devotional work or sorcerous magical practice may well be involved, but this person fulfills their duties largely through means of working with the spirits. Almost certainly they will be serving some community thereby... although in this context, it may be a non-corporeal one.

Note also that I have used the phrase "works with spirits" here, not "for." Just as there are many different relationships between people, there are many different relationships that can happen between a human and a spirit. Sometimes it's very much a friend-and-co-worker sort of arrangement. Other times, the spirit-worker is more like an apprentice to a guildmaster, or a pupil to a teacher. Or there might be a more familial kind of arrangement, with Gods and spirits as a great and loving Family who view the spirit-worker as Their own. In the case of some spirits, the spirit-worker employs them and gives them instructions. ( Read more... )

Sometimes, the connection goes down.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: for those who work for, with, over or around spirits, downtime is a feature, not a bug. You need the breaks in contact to process what you've recieved so far, to maintain your mundane functionality, and just generally collect your face. None of which necessarily makes things any easier.

The doubt is at its strongest and most maddening in the early months and years, and then with time and experience it begins to fade. But it never goes away completely. That chilling whisper rises out of the silence: What if this is it... what if I never hear Them again... what if I'm broken, what if They've left... what if none of it was real, a hallucination, a delusion...

In the specific case of the mad mage or the crazy spirit-worker, that's an even greater source of concern. I've touched on this in previous posts, but I thought I'd go into the topic in a bit more depth.
( Read more... )

If you want to be heard, speak up.

Sounds obvious, doesn't it? If you have ideas and beliefs that you think should have broader exposure, then you have to do the work of putting them out there. If you think your particular way of working could benefit other people, then share it and celebrate it.

It's not always quite that simple, of course--it's very hard for a less mainstream practitioner to make themselves heard over large, well-established mainstream groups. But when we're talking about the fringes of pagan and heathen worship, the more marginalised practices and experiences such as spirit-work and direct-contact worship, it's a different matter.

( Read more... )

So, the idea of writing in a more general, detached way about the topic as a way of processing the anxiety and fear over this summer's forthcoming work was very successful. Until I finished the piece, and then it all started to

creep

back

in.

The fear takes hold.

How bad is it going to get? What if something goes wrong? What if I'm left impaired in some way? What if this is the time where I just can't get up again afterwards? What are my peers going to think of me when they've seen me that way?

What if I fail?

What if I can't summon up the resolve to go through with it? How bad is it going to get?
What if I chicken out? What if I'm too weak? What if I'm too cowardly? How bad is it going to get?

What if I fail?

What if sabotage myself? What if I do things that will injure my health? What if I make myself ill through eating the wrong foods, not eating, not exercising, over exercising? How bad is it going to get?

What if I fail?

How bad is it going to get?

What if I fail?

What if I fail?

What if I fail?

So I went back to that piece I posted the other day and cracked it open with the intent of pruning/cleanup. And... it was kind of like the topic scruffed me and wouldn't let me go, you know? I felt like I just HAD to add all this extra stuff. Now instead of being shorter it's about 3 times as long, GAAAHHH. I ended up writing more on the emotional aspect of ordeal work, expanding on the "case-study" from 2007 and adding another one (my somafera initiation), and doing a section on risks in ordeal.

Here is what I have for the risk section: ( Read more... )



Lemme know what you think.

Incidentally: a couple of people have asked recently if it was OK to pass my journal address on to others. The answer is yeah go for your life--this one and my mordantcarnival account. Everything that's publically viewable is for public consumption. This one in particular is written to be read. I'm especially keen to get communication on these kinds of topics happening, so anyone reading this (not just my friends) should feel free to quote, comment on, link to and generally pick up and play with anything you find here. Even if you disagree with what I've written. Especially if you disagree with what I've written! I'm confident that my beliefs can stand up to scrutiny and if they can't--well, heck, I haven't really lost anything by re-thinking, have I?

It's not that I enjoy contention--I don't, I'm naturally rather a wimpy avoidant sort of person--but I'm aware that when you write about certain very emotive topics then soonre or later you're going to come into conflict with people on the other side of the debate. Best to meet that head-on, ready to engage with at least as much respect as your interlocutor has shown you. The process of discussion, disagreement and resolution, is one way in which I process information and refine my thoughts.

I'm facing ordeal again in a couple of months, and as you'd expect it is on my mind to an increasing degree as the time gets closer. To help me process, I've been writing about ordeal work: what it is, what it's not, why do it (and why not). Maybe clear up a few common misconceptions.

Firstly, what is ordeal? Ordeal can be many things. Work involving pain or other physical stressors is not necessarily ordeal, and ordeal work does not necessarily involve physical stressors. My personal working definition would look something like: “a transformatory experience involving heavy stressors, physical, emotional, or psychological, such as to take the subject out of their normal consciousness for the purposes of spiritual or personal development.” Another important—nay vital—component of ordeal proper would be the possibility of failure: the chance that one might not be able to complete the working as planned, or might suffer some form of lasting harm in attempting to complete it, or simply be emotionally unable to proceed.

Physical ordeal rituals are NOT an integral part of heathen worship. This should be made very clear. Although ordeal work as a valid part of Northern tradition practice can be supported from lore, it is a fringe activity and not a part of mainstream heathen practice.

( Blimey, this got long. )

Some readers will already be familiar with Wayland Skallagrimsson's essay Racism in Asatrú, a thorough disembowelling of Folkist belief and ideology. He's now written a follow-up piece, Responses To Folkish Heathens, where he revisits the themes and notes that in all the years since the original essay was first posted online, not one single person has been able to offer any reasoned response to counter the arguments made at the time. (What a surprise eh?)

I'm an ill-tempered git at the best of times, quick to anger and supplied with a very short fuse. There are certain things, though, that will chop off that fuse altogether and set off the whole dynamite cache like a Wile. E. Coyote cartoon. One such thing would be this book.

It's kind of a perfect storm of "send Mordant into a steaming rage"-ness. It's a curbie text, and I don't like curbieism one little bit. It's an anti-vax text, and anti-vaxxers make me spit tacks. It's written by an actress rather than someone with a background in medicine. And to cap it all, there's the title: Mother Warriors. Yep, the W-word. Cue rage.

( Read more... )

There are certain tropes in the dialogue surrounding spirituality, especially direct-contact spirit-work, that I have aquired a marked distaste for. There's "you must be this white to ride," there's "you are disabled, ergo you would have been exposed at birth back when Pantheon X were last regularly worshipped, ergo you cannot now worship Pantheon X," there's "you got laid off from your job one time and it took you a couple of months to find a new one, ergo you can never be a Twoo Heathen." And then there's "your Gods actually hate you."

That one really grates. And the more I hear it, the more it gets on my pecs. Sure, if you claim a strong relationship with Thor but sit on your backside all day watching TV on your spaouse's dime, knock said spouse about when ze gets in from work, and spend the kid's savings on beer and pot, it's fair to say that you're probably not Thor's favourite person. True, if you claim to be a Freyja's-man yet denigrate women and femininity at every turn and continually treat the living mortal females in your life like dirt, it's not entirely out of line to question whether things between you and the Vanadis are as cosy as you claim. Further, if someone is reporting communication with, say, Loki in which Loki expresses His wholehearted loathing of cross-dressers, or a talk with Odin in which the Wanderer expounds on the evils of witchcraft or the virtues of radical pacifism, it's fair to ask whether that person actually had either of those Powers on the line.

In short, if someone is claiming to be BFFs with a particular being, yet constantly speaks and acts in a way that is wildly at odds with that Being's character and mysteries, or reports communication that is not merely unusual but entirely counter to anything you'd expect the Being to come out with, then it's okay (and sometimes necessary) to question what's actually going on here.

What's not okay is "I don't like you, so the Powers don't like you either." That really bothers me. We've had a bit of a spat over something or another, and now you are Not Talking to me; that doesn't mean that the spirits are also Not Talking.

There used to exists an absolutely fascinating website made by someone called Delling9. Delling9 was apparently a very popular chap with the spirits. He recieved oodles of channelled communication from all sorts of wights; a large chunk of the NT pantheon were represented, along with various elves, a spider, Gandhi, and a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Oddly, most of these august personages wanted to tell Delling9 how much They approved of him and how much they disliked anyone that Delling9 disliked. The Dark Elf contingent were apparently less interested in sharing Their eldritch wisdom and more concerned with telling Delling9 how much they hate the Goth chicks who won't go out with him. And so on. I once came across a similarly bug-eyed piece of fan-fiction in which Loki falls to earth and spends most of His time telling Lokeans how much He's not into them. You'd think such puissant wights would have better uses for Their time, really.

This is all fairly obvious froth, but on occasion it is sorely tempting to ask "is She really going out with him?" If someone's done something genuinely ghastly to you or people in your circle, you do find yourself wondering if their connection is the real deal.

This is especially true in heathen or NT contexts. Some of the commonest wrongs done amongst people fall under the umbrella of defamation; it is easy to attack people via lies, so it happens a lot. Slander is easy. Libel--thanks to the internet--is even easier. And in heathenry, there are very clear and specific prohibitions against that sort of thing, evidenced both through mythology and historical evidence. Thus, it is very tempting, when you're the victim of malicious gossip or you witness other people attacked thereby, to say "well if you do that you can't possibly have the ear of the Gods." The damage is certainly real, the means proscribed by the Powers and the ancestors. Open and shut case, right?

But that's human thinking. Bad conduct doesn't necessarily mean that the person is unloved by their Gods, lying about their connection, or completely deluded. In the above example, it's important to recognise how endemic the concept of doing harm by lies is in our culture. This happens from the grandest scale, as when large companies lie about scientific evidence that doesn't serve their interests (the polluter that refuses to acknowledge the environmental impact of their actions, the pharmaceutical company that plays up the effectiveness of a medication whilst concealing side effects, the food supplement supplier who invents lies about AZT), right down to the personal level.

You're raised with it. The most popular kids in your school are the best liars. You're encouraged to lie to friends, lie to lovers, lie to spouses. You cannot get ahead in virtually any industry without lies and fraud. To succeed you must spin your skills and abilities beyond what they are worth, inflate past achievements, play down faliures. Most of all you must damage others through lies. You must take credit for others' work or devalue it, make rival look less competent than they are, make yourself look good, no matter what the facts are. And all the while you're doing this, you have to feel good about yourself. If you faced the sheer unpleasantness of the whole process, you'd sink into a slough of self-loathing. You have to take a real hit when you give up deceit--it puts you at quite a horrible disadvantage. Only the very skilled can fight on with one hand tied behind their backs.

Our culture is so thoroughly mired in relativism that we've practically forgotten, as a people, what truth even means. Everything is a matter of opinion. People now believe that "the truth" is whatever they can get others to swallow. What does it matter if something never actually happened, provided you can convince enough people that it did? Even when the accusation is criminal in nature--assualt, torture, abuse--it's not a lie if you can spread it around enough. And sadly, converting to heathenry doesn't just wash away that acculturated love of falsehood, any more than it washes away all the other baggage we pick up before we find our way home. You have to struggle, day and night, to rid yourself of the rubbish you're weighed down with, and to keep from picking up any more. And the Gods know this. They know that on some level the gossiper and the defamer are aware that what they're doing is wrong, and trust them to own that knowledge in the fullness of time (even if they take it to the grave).

We all fail our Gods. We all betray them. I betrayed Loki in the worst ways possible. But He forgave me and went on speaking to me, going to great lengths to maintain the connection. He sees my heart, and He knows all the parts of it that are broken and flawed, and goes on loving anyway. I honestly believe that while aspects of the communication that some person presents might be erroneous, their connection can be real; that while I personally might not see much worth to them the Gods are wiser and have a finer sight than I. Their Gods go on loving them despite their errors, just as my God has gone on loving me in spite of mine. The spirits and the Powers know why we do what we do. They don't demand that we be flawless, only that we strive.

The Powers, They deal with us lovingly. They see beauty which may be hidden from other mortals. They see our hearts; They see all our hearts; even the parts we keep hidden.


Bless bless.

Recently I've been making an effort to familiarise myself with the lore relating to the Dvergar, the dwarves of Norse lore. This is a rich field and I can already see I'm going to get a lot out of it. I'll do a longer entry on this at some point down the line, but for now I just wanted to jot down a couple of thoughts. (Largely coz I got back from camping yesterday and I'm shagged.)

Here's the famous exchange between Loki and Andvari when the former capures the latter in Ran's net with a view to stealing His gold:

...Then Loki said:

1. "What is the fish | that runs in the flood,
And itself from ill cannot save?
If thy head thou wouldst | from hell redeem,
Find me the water's flame."

Andvari spake:
2. "Andvari am I, | and Oin my father,
In many a fall have I fared;
An evil Norn | in olden days
Doomed me In waters to dwell."

Loki spake:
3. "Andvari, say, | if thou seekest still
To live in the land of men,
What payment is set | for the sons of men
Who war with lying words?"

Andvari spake:
4. "A mighty payment | the men must make
Who in Valthgelmir's waters wade;
On a long road lead | the lying words
That one to another utters."

--Bellows trans.

This is interesting, because although according to the poem Loki is on an errand to obtain the Dverg's vast wealth, he doesn't start out by asking for money. What Loki first obtains from Andvari is information--wisdom. The clear implication here is that the knowledge held by the Dvergar is of great worth, maybe as much as gold itself.

Also interesting is the content of the information requested and given up. Here is Loki, asking what fate is reserved for liars and slanderers. As has often been observed, Loki's reputation as a liar and a deciever Himself is grossly unfair, if one sits down and actually combs through the lore. Much rests on two points: the translation of frumkveða flærðanna as "Father of Lies," and on the popular interpretation of Lokasenna as consisting of slander.

In fact the accusations in Lokasenna can be seen to be more-or-less accurate when one knows about the characters and histories of those on the recieving end. It is interesting to note that in the poem, nobody really seems to be able to offer a solid defence against Loki's accusations; they must rely on distraction and tu quoque instead.

As for frumkveða flærðanna meaning "Father of Lies," this translation is up for dispute. First of all we must note that "Father of Lies" is plainly a Christian interpolation, being a Biblical title for the Christian devil (John 8:44). It is true that one interpretation of the phrase might be "originator of deceptive speech" but alternative translations have been offered in recent years, such as Selvårv Stigårð's rendering: "seductive-speaking." (Although I have to confess I'm not good enough at ON yet to work out how Stigårð arrived at his interpretation, I'm still at the plodding-through-dictionaries stage.)

A thorough investigation reveals that Loki is recorded as lying on only one occasion, and that was to decieve the hostile Thrym who had already forfeited the right to fair treatment by ripping off Thor and trying to force Freyja into marriage. Despite being short of practice Loki lies effectively and splendidly throughout the poem.

The verse quoted above is another example. Here Loki is holding Andvari to ransom, and yet asking what the fate is of those who "war with lying words." Evidently we're meant to understand that the idea of lying about someone was viewed more harshly than just tying them up and nicking all their stuff. And it is Loki who is digging out this information. Sly Loki, the trickster, will do a lot of things--He'll steal, cheat, and even murder--but we are being given to understand that He draws the line at slander.

The implications of all this are really interesting to me. Genuine information was so very precious to the culture which produced this poem that it is treated like a literal treasure--Loki will steal Andvari's knowledge before He will steal the wise dwarf's gold. False information--attacking another with "lying words"--is seen as so venomous that spreading it around gets you sent to one of Hel's rougher neighbourhoods. (Valthgelmir only shows up in this one place, but it's likely the same river mentioned in Voluspa, where murderers and the foresworn wade.)

A couple of years ago there was a guy doing the rounds of various internet fora. He'd join up and post the most incredible screed as his introductory post. It was the same boilerplate text each time. It started "Hi, I am Allfather," and I'm afraid it rather went downhill from thereon in. He wasn't just borrowing the name Allfather as a nifty handle. He actually thought he was Odin.

And Jesus.

And Nanahuatl.

And Sun Tzu, Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Arkantos, Napoleon, Che Guevara, Wild Bill, and Jim Morrison. (It might actually have been quicker and easier to provide a list of mythological and historical figures that "Allfather" had not been.) And he destroyed Atlantis. And then there was the time that Allfather and Thor flew to earth in a spacecraft. Most of the posts and this guy's website have gone poof, but you can still read the full screed here. It could have just been an elaborate troll, but the length, complexity, number of reposts, and existance of a web presence espousing the same views seem to argue against it.

( Read more... )

In closing I'd like to restate a couple of important points. One: Reasonable people can differ over important matters, and excellent spirit-workers can differ over UPG. Two: 100% signal clarity is available--if you don't mind ripping out an eye, hanging from a tree for 9 nights, training up a couple of ravens to fly around gathering intel for you, and have a magic signal-booster throne. The rest of us need to recognise that we'll have off-days sometimes, and that doesn't make us crap at our jobs.

There are nine and twenty ways
Of constructing tribal lays
And every single one of them is right!

Bless bless.

Today I went out and stocked up on easily-portable long-life dried foods. I collected together, in one easily accessible place: water-purification tablets, basic first aid supplies, alcohol-based hand sanitiser, necessary medications, fuel, a spirit-stove.

Survivalist swine flu prep? Nope, camping. I lucked out a few months back and made contact with a really nice bunch of local heathens and pagans. They hold a regular pub moot, and have these camps a few times a year.

There will be ritual activity, but I'm not signed up to do any kind of clerical duty or whatever. I volunteered to help run the food stand thingy, nice practical stuff. I'm looking forward to it. I have some big old rituals coming up in the summer--including helping to ground-crew at least one person's somafera initiation. It's going to be quite an intense time, spiritually speaking, and while I'm glad of that and appreciate the honour, I'm also appreciative of the opportunity to do the more grounded, human sort of work. I think it's very easy to forget just how important that is.*

It'll also be good to get away and off into the woods for a bit. It's been pretty nice around here climate-wise, and this region has a lot to offer in terms of varied flora and fauna. Right now all the bluebells are out, and I go doo-lally for a nice bluebell wood. I seem to remember that the New Forest is home to the Early Purple Orchid, if memory serves-

Mostly though I am just looking forward to spending time with these people. I've met lots of the other attendees in the pub, but pub moots are... well, they are in the pub. People are either a bit lubricated or dashing off to work in the am. You get wedged behind a table and can't circulate. Conversations about the ins and outs of pagan worship grind to a halt when the bar staff come to pick up your empties. It's good, but less than ideal.

They are a very cool and accepting lot by and large. I've been told that some of the heathen contingent are critical of Loki-worship, but it's a case of reasonable minds differing rather than a serious source of strife. And there are others who feel differently, including one or two Lokean folks. I've found the UK heathens to be rather different in character from the Americans; UK folks seem to lean more toward the adaptive side, and don't place as much emphasis on group religious ritual. I'm sort of in the middle. On one hand, I think the down-to-earth UK approach has a lot going for it. On the other, I sometimes feel a need for the kind of shared worship that seems to get more emphasis Stateside, and wonder if we're not trying a little too hard to be sturdily irreverent. (Isn't it great, though, that there's such diversity of spiritual expression in heathenry, and that we have such unprecedented opportunities to learn from each other?)

Also I get to sleep in a tent and have legitimate reason to use a windup torch, spirit stove etc. Part of the joy of camping is playing with the gadgets.



*Having said all that, I have probably now doomed myself to end up wearing a pink hat with bells on and leading a round of orange Tang toasts.

...still smarts, even when you're only tangentally involved.

Okay, so for those of you who don't know what's prompted this, a couple of people--one of them a virtual chum of whom I had become rather fond--have made some pretty harsh (and to my mind terribly, terribly unfair) comments regarding certain groups and individuals I'm connected with. Very public, very ugly. (Wank here, if you can stomach it.)

Even though I wasn't personally implicated and am pretty much unaffected by what was said, I was shocked and upset by the sheer unpleasantness. It literally hurt to read some of the comments and accusations. I was contemplating a point-by-point rebuttal kind of thing, but I find I'm just not up to it. It would be almost too easy to pick apart the assertions made, but I'm not sure that another sad, angry rant is such a great idea at this point. (There's also the fact that I've gone over some of this material so many times that I feel exhausted by it. I mean, seriously? Bashing Etin-worship and Ordeal work? We have to go over all this stuff again?) More aggro isn't what anyone needs right now, and I doubt anything I could say would help those involved to reverse their rather confusing heel turns.

But I can't quite let it go either.

Instead, I'm going to take another tack, and make this a happy, blessings-counting sort of post.

I am glad to be associated (even if it's only a little bit associated) with The Kingdom of Asphodel, and proud and happy to be a member of Ironwood Kindred. I find the hostility directed against Asphodel and IWK almost surreal; it's like, are we talking about the same people?

Do the people involved make mistakes? Yeah. Do I agree with them on everything? Nope. Do I ever worry about the way things are done, and feel like maybe this could be safer or that could be handled with more compassion? Sure. I feel pretty much the same way about every single other group of people I've ever been involved with. Reasonable people can have different opinions--yeah, even over big important stuff. Am I ever concerned about things like safety issues and good conduct? Occasionally--but never have I felt that my concerns were not heard, or that I couldn't take a reasonable comment about something bothered me to someone who would listen.

The folks down on Cauldron Farm have been very kind to me. Online and in meatspace I've had a lot of valuable help and support from Raven Kaldera. When I've stayed on the farm, I've been treated with friendship, hospitality and compassion. I never felt unsafe around those people. I never felt threatened, or anxious, or skeeved out. I was in some pretty vulnerable, messed-up states both times, and both times I was cared for and looked after. Everyone was super-appropriate and super-supportive. I'm going to visit the farm again this summer, and I am looking forward to it with great eagerness. I'll be attending IWK's Etinmoot--thanks to the incredible generosity of one of the members--and I look forward to spending time with them. Some members of the kindred have become dear friends as well as co-religionists, and I can't wait to see those people again. (Looking at you, ignited_spark, tamyris and kiravmoon.) I thank the Gods and wights, especially Loki, who brought them into my life.

I don't know, sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

Raging cultural insensitivity aside, this is an eminently sensible notion. I mean, I check in with the witch-doctors of my aquaintance every chance I get. I actually quite like the fantasy of having Western woo-woo merchants look at how their gear stands up against folks from cultures where modern medicine is a distant dream and magic is the only treatment available. In my brane this would go like:

Real shaman: So let me get this straight. You dilute the active ingredient how much?

Homeopath: Er, so there's one part in ten to the power of 30...

RS: And then you shake it.

H: Actually it's called successing. You see we--

RS: And while you shake it, you do what? You pray?

H: No.

RS: You chant?

H: Um, no.

RS: You enter trance and commune with the spirits of your Ancestors and ask them to intercede on behalf of the client?

H: Not... really... no.

RS: Oh...kay. And how did you learn your craft? Did the elders of your group train you?

H: I went to the local community college.

RS: Okay, so to perform this ritual, what initiation did you undergo?

H: Initiation?

RS: Yeah. How did you become a healer? Did you suffer a sickness, journey into the underworld and return with the knowledge? Were you subjected to trial by ordeal? Did you go out to a holy place and meditate for many days until you were granted this ability by your spirits?

H: Well, the course fees were pretty steep.

RS: And what happens if your clients do not recover? Do you go hungry? Do their angry families accuse you of witchcraft and burn your house?

H: Uh. You see some people actually choose to be sick, either becuase they want attention or because it's their karma, and in those cases--

RS: I've seen enough. Book'em, Danno!


Although in real life it would probably go more like:

RS: Yeah, the spirits are telling me that you're a sacred healer, you are a blessing to your people, you are destined to become a shaman and things and stuff oh yeah and you're a what was it, an indigo child. That will be my kid's malaria shots and a new roof, thanks.

H: (hands over 6 grand, does not shut up about encounter for REST OF LIFE.)

Was originally going to be a response to this thread, but ended up a bit long and self-indulgent.

Other poster: I don't know whether to smile or lament that the immediate response of most Heathens I know to someone asking to know more is to assign a fairly long reading list.

Me: Or in worse cases to offer a rude dismissal where the actual informative content is half as long as the list of the writer's qualifications.

Heilsa. I am Godhi Torvald Obscurefigurfromthesagasson MA PhD, headman of West Anglia Northern Kindred (the largest Tru Heathen Hearth in Northern Vinland), Lord of Othala Hof. I am the author of The Tru Way: Real Asatru, Horsewhip, Hanging or Bog?: perspectives on homosexuality in modern heathnry, Kitchen Kin and Hof: a handbook of Heathen Femininty, and Loki the Evil One: Why We Can't Have Nice Things. I am the founder of the Ethnospecific Asatru Foundation for Metagenetic Studies.

Read the sagas and the Eddas.

Godhi Torvald Obscurefigurfromthesagasson, Asatru Godhi.

Today I am praying for compassion.

In times to come I'm going to be dealing with a lot of people who are going through what I went through when the spirits and the Powers first made Themselves known. It's already started to happen, in fact. And I just know that some night, I'm going to be tired, and cold, and hungry; maybe my arthritis will be kicking my arse or I'll be wrestling with my asthma symptoms; or perhaps I'll be recovering from Ordeal; and some poor bastard will email me or phone me or post to a comm. about some privation, situation or demand that they're having trouble dealing with.

And I pray that when this happens, I have the self-control and the compassion not to yell "you think you've got problems? I had an NDE last week and my inhaler isn't working and my knees are making a weird clicky noise when I walk! And I have to take a transatlantic flight on Tuesday to go and do priest stuff!" and so on.

Help me to remember that even if their suffering looks slighter than mine, we've all got different boudaries and tolerances and our weak spots lie in different areas. Help me also to bear in mind that I do not know the whole of their situation, and that things may well be much worse than they're giving out. Help me to remember all the times I took some issue before communities that were notionally dedicated to sharing advice on these topics, and got hate-mail or public chewings-out for doing so. Help me to remember the times something especially distressing got gag-ordered, so I could only speak in generalities.

Help me remember also that when I've been given support and counsel, they most often came from the people who had the worst of it. Short leashes, chronic sickness, disability, sufferings past and present, pain physical and emotional didn't stop them finding a kind word for me, or some good advice. When tough love is called for, help me to make sure that it really is love that I'm offering, and not self-aggrandisment or spite. Help me to remember that while it might fellate my ego to show off those old war-wounds, this is less acceptable when the other person is actively bleeding to death. Help remember that my voice might be the thing that keeps someone going through a dark time or pushes them over the edge into despair, and help me curb a sharp tongue when need be.

Help me to remember that whether it's really spirits putting someone through the wringer or just their own head-weasles, the pain is real.

Help me to remember that even if after taking all of the above into consideration it is my professional opinion that someone really is just being a whiny brat, I have the option to remain silent and take my energies elsewhere.

Help me to remember that while I might be able to slip things past the mortals in the audience, the spirits are watching and They see what's in my heart.

So I'm browsing NT-related texts on Amazon, and Feeding the Flame pops up as a suggestion. As it happens I've already got Feeding the Flame cuz my well-chewed Loki essay is therein and the editor was kind enough to send me a copy. Oooh, I wonder if there's anything juicy in the reviews..?

Jackpot.

"Who, with any scant bit of sanity, would venture to honor the deteriorated mind? Loki was at one time buddy-buddy with the gods. Then it became a slippery-slope to an evil intent; including murder. It insults me to think that anyone would make an effort to glorify that which represents all that is without honor."

Gods that makes me so happy. Just reading it puts a smile on my face. "The deteriorated mind," "a slippery-slope to an evil intent..." it's as if a fortune cookie got called to the Tivar and started writing Amazon reviews. A toast to Godhi Fortune-Cookie!

Over at the Bad Place I see that the old "pop-culture figure vs deity" row has broken out yet again, with the l33t ch40z majykyanz arguing that a practice centred around a pop-culture figure is every bit as powerful and rewarding and meaningful as one centred around a traditional deity; that Buffy the Vampire Slayer is, if anything, a more potent force than Freyja (coz more people have heard of Buffy, right?)

( I beg to differ. )