I hate that I have to make this post.

By popular definition, an earth religion holds as inherently sacred and intrinsically valuable all manifest creation on this planet. In the imagination of earth religionists this typically includes trees, rocks, fluffy animals, bugs, water, wildfires, and all the rest. All this rest includes, yes, human beings (we are animals, after all; we have our own scientific name and everything). Human being is a category that includes everyone. If one segregates this category into subgroups that dilute, minimize, or otherwise alter or put conditions upon the inherent and intrinsic properties that are a central part of earth religion belief, such a one is not – by definition – an earth religionist. Or, if they insist that they are, they are not a very good one.

If your particular brand of earth religion involves the honoring of personalities and processes that grant life, liberty, happiness, and agency to trees, rocks, fluffy animals, bugs, water, wildfires, and all the rest then any conditions placed upon the expression of these personalities and processes within the bodies and lives of human beings is not – by definition – honoring of those personalities and processes. If, if you insist that it is, it is not a very good way of doing so.

In either case you may continue to willfully, consciously, and with the knowledge that we’re all laughing at you continue to Do It Wrong. You may also choose to make a change.

Growing a New Body

Our physical bodies are grown from genetic material inherited through countless generations. This material reaches its first full expression at birth. The second expression is ongoing and results from a combination of the material present at this first expression and the material that enters us from our environment. We are not separate from the environment around us; we are part of our surroundings, a permeable capsule that rolls around a within a much bigger sphere that contains currents of influences that swirl in micro and macro fractal complexities.

Our spiritual bodies are created from the stuff of our inherited spiritual ancestors. There is an analogy to the genetic code that exists on this plane and this complex encoded flowing substance has many names. It is a blueprint of expressions most likely to resolve as conditions allow their emergence. The spiritual genetics we are born with are not exactly a predestination, no more than our physical genetic stuff is, but it does set certain limits on the eventualities most likely to find expression.

We build these codes, interact with them, change them around, or alter them entirely as a result of various choices. Frequently we have no idea what impact we have on these various codes or indeed how long lasting the consequences of those impacts might be. Speaking specifically of spiritual codes, we risk various forms of contributive and subtractive influences as a result of mingling our stuffs with the stuff of others. This occurs in magic, in energy working, in emotional exchanges, in promises, in the accrual of debts, and so forth. Often we aren’t even aware of this mingling but then suddenly there it is, a whole bunch of spiritual junk that doesn’t even belong to us. But that’s a topic for another time.

Physical genetic code is a helpful analogy to this spiritual stuff. Genes may or may not find expression (remember how phenotype is different than genotype – expression differs from the actual code itself). Similarly the various helpful or harmful potentials within our spiritual codes don’t always find expression in a single lifetime. Typically they don’t. It takes a very, very long time for the pattern of one of these codes to find its full resolution; it takes a long time because it is very complex and because it is so given to self-perpetuation. But that’s also another topic.

The spiritual body grows and changes. It shifts in response to the influences we expose it to. It changes in response to exposure to high potency patterns, like those possessed by the Gods. There are patterns that, once set in motion, are not going to resolve without manifest emergence. The growth of a new spiritual body is one of those emergences and it can be set in motion through various types of death and rebirth. Once this occurs the very structures that hold that body together morph into new configurations.

This development isn’t exactly the same as astral shapeshifting or the changing of one’s subtle skin. It’s a rewiring of the conduits that carry the patterns around your tightly woven spiritual matrix. You end up with new bones. You end up with new organs or discover the absence of organs that used to be there or that used to have an obvious physical analogy.

My bones are made of a dark black crystal flecked with sparks of glass. There is a dark stellar vortex that functions as a reversed womb that resolves the dead back towards where the living will gather. There is transparent skin and tissues made of void. It is an empty stellar body full of minerals and crystals and deep earth stuff and void radioactive deep space with heavy iron and ice and rare compounds. It is not the hospitable stuff of fertile earth or the rich primordial potential of tidal pools or even the teeming and mysterious pockets where volcanic heat disperses into the deepest sea trenches. It is something different. Something new was grown.

Remember how the Work will change you to suit its needs? As you discover yourself changing you will learn about taboos related to purity and exposure, to privacy and tact. You will learn to protect yourself in order to protect others. You will learn to let others do their own dirty work because your emerging potential is delicate and volatile. You will become jealous and protective of your own potency and will likely become increasingly reluctant to share it with others if they are not going to further the Work’s own agenda of emergence. 

Your new body will be frightening and beautiful and so very alien. You will treasure it and marvel at its on-going becoming but remember that it’s not really exactly ultimately yours. You’re just feeding this particular daughter current of the Work Itself, allowing it to reach a purer, more refined, more concentrated potency as it courses through the many stations of the universe.

Trial, Error, and Evolution on the Path

This wasn’t what I had planned on writing about today. I’m not sure if I ever planned on writing about it, not directly at any rate. The subject came up and since I feel that it’s important to discuss, I might as well begin.

We aren’t told that failure is possible on the devotional path. This is not due to any conspiracy of silence or tendency towards reticence on the subject. It’s just that most people haven’t experienced failure or, if they have, have assigned the blame to themselves rather than seeing failure as just one of many potential outcomes inherent in this path.

I’ve frequently told myself that failure – on this path and most others I suppose – only comes when I stop trying. And, well, I did.

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Name changes?

Taking up the grateful weight of a new name is a glorious and terrifying thing. It is also a cause for celebration and a reminder that rebirth occurs continually.

(I thought perhaps to share my own naming story but it turns out I’m still quite upset about the whole thing. Though a story of failure on this path is worth telling I don’t want it to be part of this reblog. I am happy for my friend and that’s what this is about.)

Naiadis's avatarStrip Me Back to the Bone

This is, I am sure, only a big deal to me. But, I’d like to share my wonderful brain’s twisted thought processes, because . . . well, it’s exhausting, and its a very clever brain, and maybe the sharing can help other people not feel alone or not feel weird or not feel . . . whatever. Something.

Way, way, way back in 2006 – possibly as early as 2005 – I adopted the name Naiadis. I’d wanted it to be my spiritual name, and I was trying to use it as an initiation-point sort of thing. My relationship with Poseidon was in a rough patch, and choosing the name Naiadis was an attempt on my part to convince myself that despite everything, I was serious about this path, about my life decisions, etc. I’d been with Poseidon since I was 16 (though in the beginning it was not the…

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A few thoughts on faith

Faith in paganism doesn’t have any highly clarified definition. Like with many other religious concepts, we’re left to our own devices to figure out exactly what terms like faith mean and how the definitions relate to our life and practice.

My experience is that faith is not the absence of doubt, but the acceptance of doubt while going forward with whatever endeavor is in front of you. Often I’d even go so far as to say that I don’t have faith but that I trust the Gods to behave as my experience leads me to expect they will; I expect them to be true to type, so to speak, even if I don’t always know what They’re up to.

If I’m being exceptionally honest I might even say that I don’t want to have faith because I don’t want to be let down or disappointed. I also don’t want to constrain my vision out of an expectant hope that the Gods will act in a manner that I find beneficial or advantageous.

See, faith can be a lovely and noble thing but it can also be a rather naive expectation that circumstances, especially spiritual ones, will work out the way we want them to. When people say, “I have faith,” they often mean, “I feel confident that circumstances will turn out in my favor because the Gods love me and I love them.” But that’s not really faith (unless your personal definition includes that, I suppose). That’s just a narrow field of vision that generally includes putting constraints on what actions you are likely to recognize the Gods as taking. (And I’ve been victim of this thinking too, so don’t feel like I’m not including myself.)

I have faith in the sense that I trust the Gods to act as they will. I hold my confidence in Them quite delicately and I try very hard not to feel attached to any particular emanation that proceeds from the circumstance about which I am trying to feel comforted and confident. I hold this trust lightly because I don’t want to be hurt, like I said. I also hold it lightly because clinging to faith that arrests my ability to proceed (since I’m so busy trusting Them in uncertain circumstances) is not really part of my path. I don’t think I’m supposed to hold on to faith instead of doing something relevant and productive. Perhaps I can do both? Perhaps I can trust Him and also act in my own self-interest?

Hiccups happen on this path; the devotional path is not smooth and without interruption. It raises questions and not just as a result of the work being done. The questions arise because I am embedded in a polytheistic universe that accepts the presence of unexpected things and unknown Powers. But since faith can be a false gloss covering simple familiarity, it is fitting that such a mistaken be corrected.

And My Lord’s ability to correct a mistake? Well – that’s something I do have faith in.

The Bhakti Bookshelf: The Glories and Pastimes of Srimati Radharani

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Studying any devotional tradition requires one to look at what practitioners themselves have written describing their tradition and the elements within it. I’ve been looking for a nice introduction to the Vaishnava perspective on Radha for some time; many other books provide very little insight into Her or Her character. Though I’ve found a handful of books detailing Radha’s character from a non-Vaishnava and non-Hindu academic standpoint I’ve been after something a little different. In many ways, The Glories and Pastimes of Srimati Radharani is just what I’ve been looking for. Though I wouldn’t give this book my wholehearted recommendation to the novice bhakti student there are many things that might make it worth your attention.

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New Book: Further Along the Heartroad

Further Along the Heartroad! It’s a thing! Or it will be – eventually.

I’ve talked for a year or so about a follow-up to Walking the Heartroad and in all honesty, this new book has been in the works for quite a bit longer than that. For better or worse this second volume is not going to be finished quickly. Most of this has to do with the fact that I do actually write for a living which means that all my energy is given over to writing copy for drain cleaning products and not to writing books for you guys. Don’t feel sad, though; having a professional writing job has made me a much better writer and I feel reasonably confident that Further Along will be a much stronger book than the first volume. It will also be quite a bit longer, a little broader in scope (not addressing spirit workers specifically), and a lot more detailed.

Here’s the sneaky peek you’ve all been waiting seven years for. It’s just a portion because, well, I want to protect my work and I don’t want to give away all the secrets right away (plus certain aspects of the outline might change). I also included a 20-page excerpt of material from this book in the Kindle edition of Heartroad and I’ll probably share other previews as the project progresses; watch this space.

I need to thank absolutely everyone who has supported and who continues to support this very humble work of mine. Articulating the self-aware emergence of a devotional current within paganism and polytheism has been a greater adventure than I ever might have expected to take part in.

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An Outsider’s View of God-Spousery.

A well-written consideration of sacred marriage from an observer. I feel the author really gets to one of the primary points of this topic by saying that marriage, in itself, is not an achievement; rather, it’s the commitment that’s the real achievement.

My personal perspective is that undertaking this particular path is (among other things) a very strong commitment to one’s own potential. It’s a way of saying (among other things) “I want to see how far this particular path takes me, I want to know how far I can take this path with me.” In many ways, it is like undertaking a serious form of initiation. It will utterly change you not as a result of the incident itself, but as a result of the dedication the initiate applies to living in the aftermath.

Thenea's avatarMagick From Scratch

“Let us go, my Beloved, to greet the Bride
The Queen’s Whole Self shall we welcome”
— From L’kha Dodi, the Jewish Evening Sabbath service.

From: http://spiritualityireland.org/blog/index.php/2012/08/first-same-sex-buddhist-wedding-held-in-taiwan/ From: http://spiritualityireland.org/blog/index.php/2012/08/first-same-sex-buddhist-wedding-held-in-taiwan/

The term “god-spouse” always seems to carry with it a discussion.

“Can a person really be married to a deity?”

“Are they claiming equality to that divinity, and are they really any closer to them than the rest of us?”

“If someone claims to be a god spouse, I expect them to be exceptionally devoted.”

“I can’t imagine that the gods pick and choose favorites.”

While most of the discussion that non-god-spouses seem to have about the phenomenon focuses on the idea of legitimacy, I have an entirely different question to ask. What does it mean? Why have the gods chosen to do this?

Why am I even exploring this issue? My apologies to all the various and sundry god-spouses out there. You fascinate…

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On Grief, Grieving, and why I don’t think Bifrost and the Rainbow Bridge are the same – Reblogging

This is a second post by Jo speaking specifically to grief. I should perhaps say that I don’t think the Rainbow Bridge fable is the perfect solution to the grief we feel at losing a beloved animal. It is, however, virtually the only commemoration of a non-human life I can think of (I recall an article I found about a Buddhist ceremony sponsored by a Japanese medical research company to honor the lives of animals killed in their work and some particular Hindu ancestor ceremonies include animals in the ranks of dead that receive offerings).

Of course, we must also question why grief is counted as such a destructive emotion. It can be – but it doesn’t have to be. Is the reason that human hate, fear, or greed hasn’t damaged the sacred universe only due to the lack of a straightforward fable?

None of this is to argue with the author of the original post regarding the damage we humans have supposedly done to the Gods’ own bridge by way of our natural and instinctive reaction to loss. This is, at most, a counterpoint to the assignation of blame to people who don’t even believe in the existence of Bifrost. Assuming responsibility or even accountability for such perceived harm is largely unproductive. If indeed Bifrost suffers for the weight of non-human animals that were wildly loved how must the rest of the cosmos suffer for the weight of non-human animals that were tormented every day of their existence and whose only value was realized by their death? That, perhaps, is the damage we should feel most accountable for.

On Grief, Grieving, and why I don’t think Bifrost and the Rainbow Bridge are the same.

A Problem with a Human-centric View of the Spirit Worlds – Reblogging

Putting my thoughts on this subject into words is very difficult; one of the reasons it took me so long to share this piece by Jo was that I was trying to get my thoughts in order. While yes, I do believe that human thoughts and feelings have an impact on the Universe, I find that we (as humans) are most able to affect the things most closely aligned with us. Our grief, sorrow, joy, ambition, and frustrations are not likely to, for instance, change the course of a stream in Alfheim or make a ripple in the deepest pools of Niflheim. A rockslide in Jotunheim is probably not directly related to the rise and fall of human achievements and connecting the two (without additional evidence) is probably giving us too much credit.

Bifrost is not ours. It is not ours to harm or even to heal. It is not the only path between the worlds (else why would Thor have His chariot?) and even if it were, would the echoes of collective human grief so much as reach its foundations? What makes our grief so potent that it has such an impact?

The story of the Rainbow Bridge came about, I believe, because we have no convenient way of talking about the grief we feel for losing the animals we love. English lacks even the vocabulary that might allow us to name what these relationships are. I always come up empty when I try to talk about what I feel for the animals in my life. I call them family, I call them friends, but these words are not ideal or even all that accurate. They are a borrowed vocabulary pressed into service because nothing else is available.

The Rainbow Bridge is a symbol that provides a context for grief and a ritual of comfort in a culture that lacks meaningful ways to express love and sorrow for our non-human animal kin. Bifrost is a part of universal architecture. One is a product of human imagination created to meet our distinctive need to mourn, remember, and feel comforted. The other belongs to a highly specific cosmology and is primarily relevant to the Powers most closely aligned with that cosmology. I love and respect the Norse Powers and yes, I care about the integrity and well-being of the Nine Worlds and all that’s in them. However, the Worlds do not resound to my frustrations, triumphs, or even griefs. If they did, why is the sacred firmaments not trembling from the endless emotional pain of animals being slaughtered? Why have the holy halls not shuddered from the 7 billion suffering humans? If the agony radiating from this single World has not managed to upset the fundamental function of the sacred universe, I cannot be concerned with the impact of a single modern story of comfort. If I was, my priorities would be misplaced.

http://naiadis.wordpress.com/2014/10/12/the-problem-of-a-human-centered-view-of-the-spirit-worlds