When you feel,

Fear creeping up your spine and tingling. And you want nothing more than to take flight from the looming presence you feel pressing in from behind you, but you wait it out... you feel it out.

You must be doing something right.

Giving thanks,

While most of America will be sitting down to a traditional supper of taters and turkey, I will be doing none of that. I will be giving thanks to Her. Hekates deipnon synced up nicely with Thanksgiving this year.

At the start of November, I found myself sinking back into old habits. I was in a spiritual lull. Dragging my ass into my room to do devotionals was hard. My attention was gravitating towards unproductive activities, there was a general malaise about everything. I kept kicking myself for feeling this way. Spiritual lulls aren't supposed to happen right? Wrong. They happen. What I find myself getting really frustrated over, is not being able to find a way out - it's like a black fucking hole sometimes.

One night, I put myself in front of Her altar lit the candles and incense and unloaded. I asked Her for the guidance to find my way out, a method to deal with this reoccurring theme in my practice.

Yesterday it all fell into place, in no particular order:

1. No weed (still an issue for me).
2. Spiritual cleansing on a regular basis.
3. MEDITATE.
4. Devotions, daily.
5. Regular offerings.
6. DO IT.

I know, it's pretty basic shit that I should know already. It was a real DERP moment when it dawned on me. But when I get into those lulls, I have no idea where to pick my shit back up again. I often feel like I am trying to catch something in pitch black darkness. I needed to learn how to pick myself up properly and shake the dust off so that I may continue on my merry way.

It started to click as I was preparing the house for the deipnon and Noumenia yesterday. We've been out of weed for a little while, so my head was clear. I ritually cleaned the living shit out of the house, worked up a sweat and got a bit of a blister and all. Found some time to meditate, which has become something I seriously must keep up, my ADD brain can be painful at times and I find much relief doing it regularly. If you haven't read Jason Millers thoughts on meditation and think you cant do it, then I strongly suggest you read a few of his books! Then I spent the evening baking banana bread for Hermes (he seems to like bananas, more on that later), sprucing up his shrine and writing in my physical journal. When my "OH DERP" moment hit me, I ran to Hekate's altar and sang my thanks to Her.

I found myself feeling measurably better. I need to reinforce my practice when things are feeling lackluster. No, sparks aren't always going to fly, but you maintain that connection. Falling down is part of the process, it just all in how you pick yourself back up.

I give you praise Hekate. Queen and mistress of the crossroads. Illuminator. Key bearer of the cosmos and all that lies between.

For really real jouneying,

My body aches, it aches. I cant decide if it was getting out of bed last night to use the bathroom that effed my back, or the amount of journeying I did yesterday. My whole left body is all out of wack.

I went to a class yesterday hosted by Christina Pratt, it was on the basics of shamanic journeying. I have been wanting a basic primer into going into the otherworld. I mostly wanted to know if I was even able to do it. I also wanted to do it under the experience of someone, experienced in doing it! It was also a response to a prayer that was answered in less than 24 hours. There was a sacrifice involved. I had to give up buying (yes, I am a gamer nerd I will admit it) SWTOR and canceled my pre-order to pay for the class. Honestly, I could have afforded both, but MMO's are something I really have to check myself on, they can consume me. As much as I don't want to admit it, I have been told to give up hardcore gaming up. So I have.

She covered the world tree, moving up and down it; a concept that I was already familiar with. Intention, how to craft questions, spirit etiquette, etc. Our goal was to find our helping spirits.

I was really nervous, and really shy. Hah! I am a pretty serious hermit, so getting out like this was a little awkward for me.

She started drumming. I already knew of which tree would be my door, and I asked it (an Alder I know of) to allow me to go to the lower world. And I sank, I swam through dirt and rubble and was plopped out into a tunnel, the very back end of a dirt tunnel. There were roots, water on the floor and it smelled like deep rich earth, I was naked and covered in muck. I had been there before! I just never went outside of the tunnel. The doorway to the "outside" was surrounded by brambles and weeds. I stepped out of it, it was twilight and the sky had a sort of green cast to it.

It would take me ages to explain all that happened. We did several journeys that day. There was a snake, a horse, an arrogant bird, another animal that I feel a lot of pressure not to talk about or even mention his name. There was also, One Eye.

Personally, when I watched Valhalla Rising I saw One Eye as very Odin-esque. I was really curious about this, because I didn't know if this was me putting him in the journey, or if it was some sort of spirit using this image and archetype I have in my head to represent something. He was quite ambivalent to my presence. He drew me a sigil in the fire ash that we were near. Like in the movie, he was mute and did not speak. No one spoke to me in the lower world, they all communicated to me via emotions and feeling. Throughout my entire visit I was being told to LISTEN.

Each time we journeyed I found getting to the otherworld easy. It almost made me a bit skeptical, because it came so naturally. But I had the distinct feeling that I was in fact, in two places at once. After we would get back I would be groggy and a bit blurry eyed. I think I may have built up a bit of a stigma around it, or my own personal ideas of what it would actually be like or what it should be like made it harder for me in the past. Or, had I been doing it this whole time and didn't even know it!? I'm still processing the whole thing.

The upperworld was nutty, but I got there. We actually paired up with other people in our group and did a journey on behalf of our partner. That was so fucking cool! My partner and I exchanged our questions and went off. He came back to tell me why I always have the ocean in my dreams, and I told him why he hasn't had the motivation to paint. We had a good laugh because while I was traveling I kept hearing this rich southern mans voice saying, "that boy got cobwebs!" So when I came back, I had to put on my southern draw and tell him, "boy you got cobwebs!" It was good fun. It was also good to talk to people about the crazy shit I experience without them thinking I'm insane.

Now, I'm off to hobble around the house and get some work done. There is a lot to process still, but I am very glad that I am doing now, and not just thinking about it.

Done and done.

My dedication took the span of three evenings. It worked out rather well for it to end on the last day of September, I didn't specifically plan it that way rather, it just happened. So, I woke up on October 1st anew.

This oath wasn't to a deity, or spirits (that comes in time). It was to myself. A promise.

I called to my spirits, my ancestors and to Hekate. I called and I called, I kept calling... then I heard the bark of an unfamiliar dog outside, my awareness heightened and the candle light shifted just so that the face, and only the main darkened face of my Hekate plaque was illuminated. Some tears issued and I moved on with the rite.

I found something I had lost just a day before the dedication process took off. It symbolizes my union - I plan to guard and keep it, as long as it chooses to stay with me. It's a constant reminder of my promise. A constant reminder that I cannot turn back.

Although random, this happened on the second day of the dedication. I didn't even realize the (personal) significance until after the rite was done.

I went out to scout a piece of land I haven't visited in a while. It's a trail that breaks off of a main trail (former railroad track) here in my neck of the woods. I remember there being a three way dirt crossroads along the smaller trail. I figured it must have been overgrown by now. I was quite surprised to find it well intact, it really pleased me to find it that way. I rolled up a cigarette and puffed it (not inhaling) as an offering. The entrance path is very easy to get to and leads to the city. The other path to my surprise, but not really considering how invasive blackberries are here was literally choked with brambles, you'd probably bleed to death trying to walk through it. The third path you got access to by hopping over a few logs and lead right up a hill and into the forest, in a manner of speaking, that was the path I chose.

And the sun finally came out,

As I rode my bike down the paved trail, (ass hurting because I haven't been on the bike in a while) I habitually glanced at the gravel shoulder as I sped by. I'm usually on the look out for either critters, or interesting plants to identify. There I found the little brown body of a song sparrow. I knew that I could NOT leave this one behind (this bird being so dear to my heart), even though I had no proper sanitary way of taking him home. He was fairly fresh feeling, limp and in wonderful condition, so I pocketed him in my vest and went home.

I gave him offerings, water, seed and incense. With the aid of Hekate, released him. I took his wings, feet and head and buried his body along with offerings in the place where I will soon be planting my poisons. His head is now macerating, the water will make all of my plants very happy indeed.

I was really worried about doing this, and doing it wrong somehow. I've never actually done that before. But I knew that if I didn't do it, I would feel waaay fucking worse than making a mistake and doing it all awkwardly. I have a tendency to balk at work such as this because I'm horribly afraid of, "UR DOIN' IT WRONG". I cant keep waiting and sitting on this shit. I'm really glad I did it, and I know that he was too.

A strange find,

While heading into the city to do errands just the other day, my husband spotted this through the window of our favorite antique store (I was busy ogling over a gourd rattle that was painted to look like a hare). He immediately said, "I'LL BUY THAT FOR YOU" all excited like. I wasn't about to say no! I'm glad he was with me, or I would have never even seen it.

Its a very strange piece. I still don't know exactly what to think of it!

Hekate has been a real driving force for me lately, in my dreams and things like finding that plaque. When my regular practice took a nose dive into almost non-existent a couple months ago, I was sure that she left me - of course it wasn't that way at all. It was me that walked away. Thankfully she has been very patient with me.

I'm currently in the process of making daily practice a habit, and it's going very well so far. I wont allow myself to check it off the goal list until I've been doing it regularly for at least a month or more. Heh, its amazing how much better I feel just getting it done, instead of thinking about doing it.