Thursday, January 31, 2013

C is for Clue x 4

From Wikipedia.
Sometimes, things are a subtle as a 2x4 to the head. I call such "subtleties" clue by fours. Or clue x 4. You get the idea...

I'm not always the most observant person. It has taken some former partners of mine literally straddling my lap and kissing me before I realized that they might be interested back. As I said, as subtle as a 2x4 to the head. But what does this have to do with paganism, witchcraft, or other such woo?

Many of us are a little bit dense when it comes to our practices. Sometimes it takes getting beat over the head with a clue x 4 more than once for us to wake up and listen. Or, in my case, the ceiling literally falling in, because that's how much subtly is in my life.

A while ago I had one of my worst depressive episodes, shit got real bad. And that was when I started to really pick back up my practice. My college had not been religion-friendly, and I hadn't changed my non-practicing habits immediately after. So, when the shit hit the fan (unemployed, depressed, single) I had the time to sit down and begin again. I picked up my tarot deck and sat down to see what it had to say.

In the first few weeks after picking it up? I learned every way possible for my Tarot de Marseille deck to tell me I was depressed. I ask about anything, and it's reply was "you're depressed." Not advice on something to do, not telling me it was going to get better or worse, just every way possible of smacking reality in my face. Apparently, since I was finally learning to read from more than just the little white book, my deck decided to make it very easy for me to understand what it was saying. Anytime those cards pop up? I know what they mean. I know the variations on the theme, upright, reversed, sideways, blocked, blocking, I know those cards. And though I finally got it on another subject, my deck chooses to continue with the smackings of my head. When I branched out into another deck, it shared the head-smacking qualities.

I warn people when I read for them that I will seem to state the obvious. That my readings will not be what they want to hear, and that even when I have absolutely no clue what the shit I am saying to them means, they will have no doubt as to the meaning of my words.

My divination methods seem to think I'm a thick-headed child. Who is they must speak to slowly, in small words, and quite possibly at the top of their lungs.

Except the Runes. I've finally begun reading with them, and it still a clue x4, but instead of a simple 2x4, it's an elaborately carved 2x4 with beautiful and detailed drawings smacking my head repeatedly.

Maybe some people can pick up on the little things. A song or two, something overheard from conversations, etc. My ADHD brain doesn't pick up on them in any permanent way. It floats right on by, and even if I notice it's quickly lost to the next passing squirrel.

It isn't that the little things don't matter. The conversation after a class at a completely unrelated event, the squall line across a lake, a moment spent cuddling with the dog... They matter, personally and spiritually, even religiously. But the meaning is that which I have inscribed. Those moments are moments of faith and appreciation. They aren't unexamined, things to ponder, messages I need to understand, or lessons to learn.

So, Universe... what are you smacking me upside the head with tonight?

Friday, January 25, 2013

Pagan Blog Project: B is for Bard

Bards. Oh Bards.

A small, heavily armed Bard from the
D&D 3.5 Player's Handbook.
Inevitably, my mind jumps to the (usually) least consequential member of an adventuring party in a game. Such as the spoony bard from Final Fantasy IV/II fame. My mind goes to the stereotypical useless class of bards in 3.5, except that the one time I did play a bard, she kicked so much ass that it got ridiculous. Bards, useless, lute-toting story tellers.

And all of those associations are full of shit. Yes, my associations are bullshit.

The Immortal Bard is Shakespeare, a playwright.* Stories are ridiculously important to me, as is music (even if my singing is painful beyond measure.) They speak to the kind of truth that isn't about facts, and that is something I hold dear. Allow me a digression (because I do love my digressions)...

Last May, I was in a discussion with a friend about my beliefs as a polytheist. Pretty sure this friend is an atheist, but not the proselytizing, anti-religious variety. Rather, she deeply and profoundly wanted to understand. And we spent a lot of time on the subject of mythologies. I said that myths could be true without having actually happened. That truth wasn't about factual instances, but something more. She truly had no idea what I was trying to say. No idea what I meant by separating truth from fact. I told her to read The Little Prince. A day and a half later she came to me and said she understood, though her precise words were thanking me for making her read that book.

Bards don't report facts. Facts are much like statistics, they can be twisted to mean just about anything. Bards are truth tellers. They speak to the truth of the matter, but they do so through the performance and written arts... the non-visual arts. The art of music, of dance, of theater, of poetry, of stories... and maybe too the visual arts but we don't call them Bards. Maybe we should. Because if you stand in the Musée d'Orsay in front Van Gogh's Starry Night Over the Rhone, I defy you not to see the truth in his work. Or more contemporarily, Bards are found in film. Casablanca is a fictional story, made during WWII in 1942, and it has became a classic. More importantly is the scene where the cast begins to sing the French national anthem, drowning out the nazis's own song. What most people don't realize is that extras and minors roles were filled with many refugees and exiles. The fictional film brings to light the truth that could not be otherwise felt deep in one's gut.

I have a deep and abiding love for art. Honestly, my deep and abiding love for art is especially true for those forms that are "traditionally" in the bardic arts. Written and spoken word, music and performance.  Yet, my associations are so dismissive. I'm not saying there isn't frippery and really really BAD shit in those fields (I hesitate to use art to describe anything Katy Perry has touched); however, even in the shit-tastic land of pop music charts we get gems like Cee Lo's "Fuck You." And if you have ever been dumped, no matter the circumstances, you most likely can relate to that one.

The specific word "Bard" has been on my mind for over a year. Since a professional divination reading (in regards to a ritual I did that year) turned up the word, it has been on my mind. But it came up in connection to another word, and that to me is a large part of why Bards differ from other artists.

Community.

Bards serve communities. They speak for a people, even if that people has yet to emerge. Shakespeare wrote for England, and though he did write for royalty, his main audience was the average worker. Today's high brow art form is literally yesterday's flipping the finger (or even fart jokes.) It spoke to a community of people.

I am lacking in community these days. I have been remiss in establishing a spiritual network, or any sort of local network for that matter. My social systems are scattered around the country. Texas, Missouri, California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Washington, District of Columbia... Yeah, I'm not so locally based, and none of that community is spiritually based.

Which is something I've seen the need to change. And I'm beginning to. Slowly.

Except that word keeps ringing in my ears. Bard. Bard. Bard. Each time like a clear bell tone, cutting through the cacophony in my head. I am a writer. I am a story teller. I am occasionally even a poet. I've been a musician, and perhaps it is time to retrain that as well. That word ringing between my ears, and after over a year of marinating, I'm pretty sure it is something I need to become. At least, for now, as who knows what tomorrow shall bring. For now, though, it is an archetype to work with, to contextualize experience, and to give direction to my ever present learning.

None of this even begins to touch on the power that the bardic arts have. Words have power, and language is a spell, a magical system, even before we start down the path of us spooky types. Words the ingredients, grammar the structure, the rules to follow and break as we so choose. The power of practice and focused rehearsal, of the repetition of edits and hammering out that sentence or rhyme. But... I've rambled for long enough. The innate magics of Bards can be a subject for another time.


*Throughout this post I use and reference Shakespeare, and another dead white guy here and there. I actually am not a fan of how "big" such works are and how thoroughly canonized Shakespeare's plays have become, nor am I a huge fan of using yet another dead white dude; however, they are convient examples because of all that jazz, since most people are familiar with such works and general attitudes about it. Maybe one day I'll post a rant about the literary canon. My old professors would be so proud. (/sarcasm.)

Monday, January 21, 2013

Pagan Blog Project: B is for Boundaries

Maybe this post ought to belong more under L for Liminality, but boundaries will do. And if you wonder why this is a few days late, go look up Douglas Adams' opinion on deadlines.

I exist at midpoints and cross-sections, my life is a liminal space. Some of this is obvious, seeing as I'm not just trans (FAAB if you're wondering) but literally "in transition." My physical body hops back and forth across the line between what are considered traditionally male and female attributes. I'm not what most people would consider androgynous, but for those who really get to see my body there isn't a better word. Unless there was a word akin to ambivalent for androgynous, as I am not a blending, an absence, but rather a mix of strongly attributed signs of both male and female. But I digress. The point I make here, is that my life isn't actually filled with mixes of colors. It appears that way from a distance, like a Seurat painting, upon close inspection it is series of dots. I'm strangely unmixed, filled with boundaries instead of a smooth blend. So, unshockingly, boundaries have been on my mind a great deal lately.

Boundaries are something many (if not most) pagans/polytheists/etc. recognize as a thing power. Most magically inclined people I know have some kind of ward on their home specially based/focused on the threshold. 

Look at transitional times and spaces, we find some truly spiritually powerful concepts. Dusk and dawn, the times of twilight when we exist in neither day or night. Midnight is the division between the days themselves, and aniversaries, be they the New Year, or the marking an occasion like the day one was born, are celebrated thresholds in time. The tops of cliffs mark the border between earth and sky, and sometimes water, if they fall off into a lake, river, ocean, etc. The boundaries are sacred places where difference meets.

Except, many woo/spooky sorts of people have a really terrible sense of personal boundaries. We don't admit to how much we nonconsensually push our energy on others. Coming from multiple communities where every touch was asked, even a handshake or a welcoming hug to an old friend, the I abhor idea of sending personal energy to another person without prior consent

A concept I picked up at a BDSM class was the idea of ETDs, energetically transmitted diseases. The woo-folk in the class all got sudden looks of realization. Upon the instructor saying "you know how you hook up with someone, and end up with their baggage?" everyone else's faces in the room got the same look. Ever since then I've been drastically more careful about my own personal energetic boundaries. Particularly when hooking up with people, I'm very careful about making sure neither of us walks away with the other's shit to deal with.

Except many people who work with energy do NOT think about boundaries. So many people send healing energies at others without prior consent. Sure, healing energies have their time and place, but to me it's akin to penicillin. Sure, it revolutionized medicine and treated all sorts of things, but if you give it to me, I end up in the hospital. Not to mention the number of things it doesn't do anything about. Sending unwanted energy? Same thing. Other people having written about this subject more in depth and more eloquently. But the fact remains, many pagans/woo type folk are shit about consent.

I hold no excuses, and in my early years as a practitioner I was not so great about consent either. But partway through high school I realized my energy didn't "play well with others." There were a lot of reasons for that, but those didn't matter half so much as the realization that pushing unwanted energy onto others caused actual problems. My life was a shitstorm of mostly-failed attempts at coping, and no one deserved an ounce of what I was going through. Their lives were hard enough without someone else's shit dropping in on them. When I finally heard the concept of ETDs, things clicked into place. Years prior I had that knowledge but not the words. I stopped working with others in any spiritual or magical capacity for years until my life, and energy, were drastically more under control.

Clear defined boundaries are something we need to pay a lot more attention to. Yes, because they are healthy useful things that keep us all healthy and productive. Yes, because of consent. Yes, because even spirits and Gods sometimes need to be told a clear "No." But beyond all that, we need clear boundaries because boundaries are sacred. That clear line delineating between my energy and yours? Sacred. It is a holy thing to me. Respecting that boundary, and crossing it with permission are sacred acts to be celebrated. Respecting the power found in boundaries, and liminal spaces, requires respecting those boundaries.

It isn't about crossing lines or not crossing them, it's about being aware of permission, of consent.

Thursday, January 3, 2013

PBP: A is for Ambivalent

Ambivalent is a delightful word, but not what many people assume. I like it's denotation. Definitionally:  simultaneous and contradictory attitudes or feelings (as attraction and repulsion). Thank you Merriam-Webster.

Simultaneous. Contradictory.
Concurrent. Opposing.

As a person I am filled with ambivalence. I am rarely apathetic, but often appear to others that way because I am filled with such a mix of strong emotions. Getting excited meant being told to "calm down" or "there's no need to be upset" even if all I was doing was expressing interest. So, unless there is a strong emotion without a similarly strong opposition, I tend not to express myself overly much. There are too few words for adore/abhor, for petrified/pleasing, for desire/disgust... There is this notion that when you mix strong emotions, it is black + white = the banal flat grey. Instead, ambivalence is akin to mixing colored light. Red + Green = Yellow. A whole new color emerges. Magenta (Blue + Red) + Green = White. We always think of white as an absence of color, despite many of us knowing that really it is all the colors, formed by compliments and contrasts.

My path is one of opposition.

I am a person filled with ambivalence, so it is not shocking that ambivalence fills my spiritual practice as well. Strong contradicting emotions are an underlying theme in much of what I do. I am ambivalent towards much of Judaism, especially to the many things that leave any ancestor work out of the question. I am ambivalent even towards something as basic as meditation. I dread and welcome my dreams as well.

Every bed I slept in with regularity (in the years prior to my current bed) was warded against dreams. Not just warded to keep me from dreaming, but from all dreams. I daydreamed elsewhere. I drew up wards strong enough that a former lover could not spend the night in my bed because she would wake up unrested if she didn't dream. I warded good dreams and bad dreams, portents, contacts, and the ramblings of my own mind. I had to refresh them regularly, for they took quite a beating from my sleeping mind.

I warded against dreams because most of my dreams were nightmares, many related to my history of trauma and abuse. The little relief I had from nightmares were not actually better, as instead it became an escape from reality that made it incredibly difficult to function the following day. Knowing that without wards I had a 95% chance of not being able to handle it, I created quite possibly the strongest wards I have ever consciously set my mind to make. Repeatedly. (Especially as I moved quite often in those years.) Rather than attempting something beyond my capacities, I delayed dealing. It was a marathon to deal with, and attempting would not only leave me tired, sore and no where near the finish line, I was incredibly likely to injure myself in the process.

Since moving to this apartment, no wards against dreams have been erected. This bed, with two and a half years under me, is not a fortress against dreams. I relish each dream I receive, because with the years of warding they are infrequent. I remember them poorly, and understand them even less. I relish each one, even while I dread the dreams that leave me broken.

For me, not even love of Those Who I Work With is unopposed by another contradicting emotion. Nor do I think it should be (at least, for my current relationships with Them.) My gnosis and belief is filled with skepticism. I mix lights to bring out the shape of things, to bring out their shadows.

I need a word for adore/abhor. For disgusted desire. We know these states, but so rarely do single words describe the ambivalence. So, I seek words that describe them, the simple word to capture the rainbow in white and the contrasting shadow.

Decided to do PBP2013 with the following attitude in mind: Posts will happen when the time coincides with something that makes sense for me to post publicly. Just figured I'd mention in case anyone is going through this blog as a whole/not just from the Pagan Blog Project.