Today I recognize that I am worth of love

After reading The Gifts of Imperfection I wanted a reminder of the lessons it taught. I now read through it at least once a week, sometimes daily, and find it thoroughly centering.

 

Today I recognize that I am worthy of love
and that all beings are worthy of love

I stand my sacred ground
even as the winds of antagonism and insecurities blows around me

I will be brave, so that others can be brave
I will be my real self, so that others can be their real selves
I will shine brilliantly, so that others can show their brilliance

I will not be ashamed of being imperfect
I will not feel guilty for being imperfect
I will not succumb to regret
I will not be afraid of failure
because failure is inevitable
and it is merely a passing moment, not an ending
and being awful is not really that awful after all

I will lean into the discomfort
because anger and sorrow are part of being human
and if I experience any emotions
it means I can experience all emotions

I will cherish faith
and never let it go
because I have faith that the world will be a better place
and I have faith in the goodness of others
and I have faith in myself, today, just the way I am

I will remember and acknowledge my blessings
I have those who love my fully as the imperfect human I am
and I have all that I need

I recognize the value of sleep and self care
the time to rest, the time to play around
because this is the stuff of balance
and balance is the stuff of real happiness

Today I recognize that I am worthy of love
and that all beings are worthy of love

This book is changing my life

It’s not pagan-themed, but it is something I needed to read right now to be a better, more joyful person who lives well. It’s something I need to work through before being able to grow spiritually.

I found out about it from the author’s TED video:

The book: The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown

Burying a Beloved Pet

The only pets that fit into my husband’s and my life right now are sugar gliders. Yes, you probably don’t know what they are. Here’s a photo:

Think a gray-scale chipmunk with a long tail and the ability to glide on flaps of furry skin like a flying squirrel.

We got a pair back in February, almost a year ago. While away for winter vacation, the girl of the girl/boy pair passed away. It is a risk with these animals. They are so small that there are a number of dangers and toxins that could have been momentarily sniffed or licked, or a bladder infection that wasn’t noticed, or a number of other things. Yet she died, and my husband and I were crushed.

They were originally supposed to only be my pets. I remember that specifically: my husband sighed as he finally approved them as a potential pet, but said they were hideous and “they will be your pets, not our pets”.  Which of course guaranteed that he would fall head over heels over them. I have rarely seen him cry. The only time in the last year was when his grandparents died. He cried a few times over lovely little Lulu.

A picture seems appropriate here. Here is one shortly after we got her, a 2-month-old baby who had trouble balancing easily on the edge of her food dish so she just laid down in it instead.

We buried her with a felt nesting cloth and leaves, because she was a nester. We would periodically stick in a silk leaf or piece of felt cloth in the bars just above her sleeping pouch, and she would quickly pull it in and spend a half an hour arranging it just right.

I honored Lulu with a good burial, thinking of pagan burials of old with artifacts to follow them into the next life, and hope her spirit is comforted and delighted with the sea of leaves and scraps of felt we buried her with, along with her favorite kinds of treats.

I gave an apple as an offering to Manannan Mac Lyr, and sent Lulu our love and hopes for a peaceful journey into whatever lay beyond this life for her sweet little spirit.

I mourn her passing. Yet I find this is the easiest passing of a family pet who has died. When I was little, people told me that animals could not go to heaven, and in my teenage years, when I stopped believing in heaven and hell, I was frightened by death. The rituals and beliefs of my childhood were abandoned, but nothing had settled in its place.

I do not claim to “know” what happens to our souls or spirits or what-have-you, but I believe that the energy does not — cannot — simply disappear. I know that my ancestors are remembered and honored, and I believe they are at peace. I honored them by name and prayer each last Samhain. I will honor Lulu at the next, and the next, and the next after that. The continuity of ritual is a profound comfort.

 

A Lapse

Sometimes I go through long periods of posting on my spirituality blog even though I’m pondering a lot about my own spiritual path and keeping up regular devotional prayers. I just don’t get around to the written reflection part.

Lately has not been that sort of time.

Lately I have not been really practicing.  Other than the Samhain stand, I’ve done very little, and I’ve felt spiritually empty.  It is weird going through this sort of phase. I start asking the big questions about life: What is this all for? Is this it? Is there a point? Am I making a difference? Am I a part of something greater?  Am I connected to something greater?  Is there something greater?

Work has been hard. Getting by day to day has been hard. Nothing “big and bad” has happened, it’s been just one tired sigh after another.

Time to get meditating again. Time to light a candle for Brighid.

Samhain Greetings!

I always feel a little overwhelmed with the holidays, and thus haven’t always gone through with any sort of celebration. So instead of planning a ritual, I want to start with little traditions that are inclusive for all the non-Pagans in my life, like my husband and the rest of my family.

Here’s something I started this year and plan to continue in future years. I made and wrote little notes to those I’ve known who have passed away, or in some cases, grandparents I didn’t know but have heard so much about that I wish I had.

When I began, I asked my husband if he wanted to write anything. He declined, but then saw me preparing the final product, and said, “Well, I didn’t know you were going to light candles and do that!” Then he promptly got some paper and did the same, and said he looked forward to doing it with kids and possibly having extended family come for an evening to celebrate the same way. “I really like this,” he kept repeating.

I love beginnings.

Seemingly scarce, and looking forward to children

I’ve been rather absent from my blog, much more than I had intended, but it is not because of a lack of interest in Druidry or Neo-Paganism. I’ve spent this spring thinking and pondering. I’ve been considering my connection to this path, feeling my growing internal resolution — or rather, realization — that this is indeed the right path for me, at least in the here and now. I’ve spoken with my significant other about wanting to raise our children in Neo-Pagan traditions, and had an explicit conversation with a close older relative to let her know of this decision and encouraged her to always ask any questions that she might have.

I think more and more in this frame of mind: what can I do today to prepare for a family with kids in the future? I am not currently ready for a child in my life, but that day is coming soon and I’m really looking forward to it. This is partially sparked by my older sister recently having her first child. Seeing that shift in her life makes me think of that not-so-distant shift in my own. Holding her month-old daughter on a recent visit to Idaho was simply wonderful. It felt completely right; it was grounding, an experience that makes you stop and realize what’s really important as all else in the world falls away.

The experience also made me consider a future change in career. I’m currently a public school teacher, and overall I do enjoy my job, but I’m unsure if I will enjoy it for a lifelong career. All job-specific concerns aside, I’m not sure if I was made to have a single lifelong career. I am a Gemini through and through; I have a million interests and I always like to learn about and try new things. However, the only alternatives I had previously thought of sounded nice but didn’t seem like they would be satisfying enough for me.

Lately, though, I’ve been looking into being a nurse midwife. There is a 2-year certification program not far from where we plan on moving. The only aspect of practicing medicine that’s ever appealed to me is women’s health, but lately this idea has really struck a chord in me. It is not just a wistful thought, but rather I can see myself doing it, and being happy and balanced, too. I wonder if my slowly growing relationship with Brighid has a bit to do with it?

It’s not something I plan on doing immediately, but after having my own kids I will need to seriously consider my options.

In Idaho

I’m currently visiting my family in Idaho. Just a few minutes down the road from my aunt’s house is a huge public free range field for cattle, filled with golden grasses and sagebrush and shy cattle. I stepped out into the field into a clump of sagebrush, crushed and smelled a leaf of it in my fingers, and looked out onto the valley in which I was born.

Then I shouted my morning devotional prayer. I called it out into the wind, out across the fields, knowing that none but the Kindreds and the cattle could hear me.

Usually my morning devotional prayer is said in a quiet or normal voice in the morning, the first words I speak through a scratchy throat, not too loud so I don’t wake my fiancé or disturb the neighbors. I say it to an indoor prayer, hoping the heater or A/C won’t turn on and disturb the candles.

I had no candles in Idaho. I had no symbols for the Well, Tree & Fire other than the landscape around me. When it came time in my devotional to “bathe my face” from water from the well, I had to pantomime it. And yet I have never felt so alive, so connected after my devotional. It was a most exhilarating and liberating experience!

Pictures of the cattle on the private land on the other side of the road:

 

A Sonnet for the Fool

I used to keep a blog for poetry, but I think instead of restarting that I’m going to merge that with my spirituality blog. Poetry and music are very powerful spiritual influences for me, so it seems silly to separate them.

I cross-posted this on my Tarot blog (which had a long hiatus), but I wanted the poem here, too.

This card and its description remind me of a poem (a sonnet in iambic pentameter) that I wrote way back in my senior year of high school:

I stand upon the rough edge of the peak,
The rock cuts into my bare feet, fragile.
Above, through lowly clouds, I wish to seek
A thing that, when I see, will make me smile.

The ocean roars, and now my trembling knees
Do threaten to undo themselves, and I
Will fall into the merciless, foul seas,
And that much further I’ll be from the sky.

But what will happen when I leap in faith?
Will wings of angels catch me ere I fall,
Or will the chains of earth be as a wraith
And curse me to a never-ending brawl?

I can’t resist the urge to leap, to try,
So powerfully I hear the call to fly.

The Hobbit: Opening Ritual for Filming

About seven minutes into this first “behind the scenes” video for the filming of The Hobbit, there is a fascinating opening ceremony and ritual in Maori. Thought some fellow Pagans might also find it interesting:

First Oath

(adapted from the First Oath in ADF’s “Our Own Druidry”)

I come before the ancestors,
the land spirits, and the gods
to declare myself a Pagan.
I am a seeker of the Old Ways,
a worshipper of the Elder Gods.

With this sacred oath
I set my foot upon the path, the Druid’s Way,
for I seek a relationship with the Kindreds
and I am cultivating the the practice of living fully.

I vow to seek virtue in my life,
to do right by my kin, my friends, my community, and myself.
I vow to make my spirituality real
by keeping the rites and workings that call to me.

I vow to deepen my understanding of the Old Ways
through study and practice
to fill myself with the truth of the Elder Path.

These things I vow to myself
in the presence of the ancestors,
in the presence of the land spirits,
in the presence of the gods and goddesses,
and my Exalted Brighid.

So be it!