I.P.V.B.M.: Fluff, Balance, and Perception

My second installment in a series of posts for International Pagan Values Blogging Month.

As a Kemetic polytheist, I have many reasons why I will not choose to join a temple or related group. Petty politicking, cults of personality, differences in Egyptological interpretation or approaches in practice. In addition, I am a being that walks always on the edge and the outskirts of things. It is part of my path. I find holiness in the taboo, in the borderlines. Like my Patron, I seek ever to be the Edgewalker, between worlds, bridging gaps, passing between boundaries, pushing limits, encouraging others to do the same.

At the same time, I can also be an opinionated person, with passions and a temper that could only be described as Setian in nature. Trying to balance this is a constant feat of self-control, a balance in it’s own right. To find balance between striking down the falsehoods, and respecting differences of opinion, is not always a clear-cut task for me.

Through the course of my travels I have encountered people who claim to interact with the same deities I claim. Sometimes I find this indeed a hard thing to wrap my mind around–their descriptions of them, and interactions thereof, seem to fly in the face of my understandings of them, and even mythological and archeological records of them. I begin to wonder if we are both speaking to the same deity. How does one draw the line between striking down falsehood, and promoting peace and unity, if such a thing can honestly be attained? For the most part, I’ve never engaged in some of the serious, but yet petty, arguments and discussions relating to paganism and polytheism on the internet. Part of this is my avoidance of group settings, another is that I am a private person, I am for the most part, as my name states “solo” in much of my habits and actions. A hermit, in every mythological sense of the word.

That won’t, however, stop me from witnessing certain arguments, or holding a strong disagreement against a certain thing. And you know, when I hear mention of occult-type gatherings where “cuddle piles” are occurring, or some perky and bubbly Kemetic proclaiming “Squee! Seth is my daddy, I’m so much like him, and he loves me soooo much!” it’s going to be very hard to relate to them, or to take them very seriously. This goes beyond the simple fact that I am a very hands-off person when it comes to physical contact or affection, and am not one prone to bubbly, fannish behavior. Then again, I never was one to treat my spirituality as a fandom, but as a way of being, incorporated in all areas of my life.

That would be where I’d define “fluffy”. On the other hand, there are many areas occultists and other pagans would think me a bit fluffy: I identify as an otherkin/therianthrope, I believe in reincarnation, just to name a couple examples. To use the term to strike down a belief structure is, I feel, limiting and closeminded. On the other hand, one should not be so openminded that their head falls completely out of their skull, that commonsense is chucked out the window. No one questions, no one encourages further learning. People take what they are given by self-proclaimed gurus handing them out on silver spoons, or try to warp the deity to fit their own paradigms, until it reaches a point to where they no longer resemble the deity of myth, or the deity of my understanding.

This kind of reminds me of earlier discussions on UPG. My view on this is that it very much has a place in one’s spiritual practice–to strike down UPG as “fluffy” is to deny the creative and individual experience of the sacred. If one adheres slavishly only to what is written in mythology and archeology texts, it grows stale, soulless. Spirituality is an organic experience, and even back in the old days, it grew and evolved and transmuted itself, even on the individual level. Again, as a borderline person, I strongly recommend a balance be struck: the UPG and the VPG (Verified Personal Gnosis), or the CPG (Confirmed Personal Gnosis). Walking this middle line isn’t being wishy-washy, to me it’s only personal balance.

I don’t think that the uneducated, the willfully ignorant, or the otherwise “fluffy” should be suffered. But one has to wonder what is there to be gained by needlessly waging war with such people. While one is out “fluffy buny hunting” as I’ve heard the term used, couldn’t that time be spent in other areas, maybe educating yourself, or otherwise developing important metaphysical skills, occult knowledge, spiritual union with the divine? How much of it are you spending in actually learning? Although I’m not what one would call a pacifist, I’ve lately taken the approach of combating the cotton candy through example, through writings, through research. I can’t be bothered to engage in long debate, or to constantly correct people, no matter how much I think they’re right and they wrong, or what the books tell me otherwise. It’s not to say that I won’t do it, but what I suppose I’m trying to say is that I’m beginning to pick my battles more and more, especially since there are things in my life that carry greater weight than what some person who I feel is a fool is spouting off about on the internet.

On top of all that, maybe I just don’t know enough about a person, especially on the internet, to tell if they’re going through a moment in their life–did they involve themselves with the wrong person or group of people disseminating the wrong information, are they just starting out, or other factors? I had experiences walking out of an abusive, cult-like situation. I also had my early start like everyone else, and said and did some dumbfuck things in the past. I still do. Shit happens.

My point, I guess to boil it all down is: are people willing to learn from their mistakes, or not? I’m not anyone’s daddy, I’m not going to wipe anyone’s asses. I’m still going to write, and share my experiences, or those I am able to share. The rest is up to whatever persons in question, or whatever gods or spirits out there watching over them.

A Few Notes on Weakness

This is moreso a follow-up to my post Falling Apart, Coming Back Together that I had been meaning to write, plus a supplement to my more recent Past, Patterns, and Keeping Silent.

To help me begin, I’m going to bring up Phil’s comment in the former post, in which he brings up some very good points. In order to help me compile just what I’m trying to say however, I’ll start off by saying that I too have chronic illness–in fact it was the onset of this chronic illness that tipped the scales when it came to my shamanic practice. I had leanings most of my life, but it was in 2005 when this thing hit, that the dam really burst open for me. I still have it. No amount of discipline, praying or “mind over matter” will ever make it go away. It’s here, and here to stay for the rest of my life. This doesn’t make me weak, or inadequate, and certainly not incapable of performing the duties in the path I walk. I walk a more ordeal-oriented path as a result–but this wasn’t my choice. Psychological scars also are present, and there are things, mentally and physically, that I will never “get over”.

Or, to put it this way: Certain things never will be gotten over–and no one should ever expect you to.

Sometimes it is only in the presence of injury, disease and related hardship that true knowledge can fully blossom.

In fact, this is one of the reasons why I always detested and despised the New Age drek The Secret or the Christian Purpose Driven Life, or otherwise related ‘name-it-and-claim-it’ philosophies. No matter how skilled a magician you are, or how hard you pray or how disciplined you are…shit happens. It just happens. It’s what you do with that shit, what you transmute it into, that matters.

Phil’s quote in his one reply was quite handy in this:

This is where the idea of lycanthropy as a disease can be useful. If you let it control you, and it is the master, that’s the bad situation where you have amnesiac werewolves who go on killing sprees. If you can control it, and use it most productively, let the beast out when it needs to get out and so forth, then that’s a position of true power and mastery, and it doesn’t involve squelching it or conquering it, or getting rid of that disease either (which is something one rarely sees in films and such…).

Of course you can apply this to a wide variety of ailments, but the general idea is there. And I think, for the moment, I’ll leave you all to ruminate over that, because my ability to form intelligent words right now is drastically flagging at the moment.

The Past, Patterns, and Keeping Silent

In looking back through my childhood (not an easy thing to do), I realize that I had all of the (stereo)typical behaviors of a magician and shamanist in the making. Traumatic events, both explained and unexplained. My brain was wired differently–so differently that I was consistently medicated for it from the age of seven, and reminded of it for every day of my life. I didn’t start actively trying to make friends until college, and even then, I wasn’t very social. I’m still not. As far as practitioners go, I’m very, well…solo.

Though unlike some, I was very underwhelmed when I began reading about magic, paganism and the occult back in my preteen years. It all seemed to describe to me things I knew already, or was already experimenting with. I somehow didn’t seemed too incredibly surprised to find others doing the same, though I was surprised to be able to connect with like-minded individuals who fit that niche. When it came to the occult and the paranormal, the big thing that really surprised me was that a thing like “otherkin” and “therianthropy” existed outside of my own little island of being. The honeymoon period with that, however, is long since over. I no longer actively seek connection between peoples that fit those two descriptors, simply because most of them are merely trying to escape from themselves and the species or world they were born into. I have no commonality with the false, the damaged, and the confused.

It leads me to wonder why I deal with the occult or animistic community at times. I can’t really say I deal with it as much as some–I am virtually inactive on most social fronts aside from my writing. But the patterns I seem to pick out most readily is the glorification of the bullshit artists and “internet shamans” that float around out there. The ones that are glorified for their fanciful storytelling, name-dropping, pity-partying and attention-seeking through their traumas (which, they feel, is an automatic badge for the practice of shamanism). Although they claim to be healers and to (desire to) help others, in the end they help no one but themselves–if you can really call it “help”. The people they surround themselves with are nothing more than yes-men, psychophants and enablers. But amongst these people are those who, I was astonished to find, are actually reasonably intelligent people. It stunned me to think that people who were so smart could be duped by such high school grade behavior. It wasn’t until I read Daniel Pinchbeck’s Toward 2012: Perspectives on the Next Age did I find out that Carlos Castaneda had actually duped a fair amount of professors who even had studied the Yaqui culture. Suppose this thing could happen to someone regardless of intelligence, though it leads me to speculate why, and how. The essay within the book, “Shamans and Charlatans: Assessing Castaneda’s Legacy” is well worth the read and relevant to this part of my rant. In fact, Reality Sandwich has some great essays in general on a variety of topics.

But it’s one of a few reasons why I step back, or remain on the periphery of what people there call “community”. I was never much a social being, which is kind of funny you think, coming from someone who claims strong alliance to canine archetypes. But witnessing this sort of thing is a turnoff towards community. The bullshit artists, the spindoctors. Plenty of people can write books and still be completely incompetent, and just because you’re popular doesn’t always make you right. I’m also a private person, and the extreme freedom by which occultists and shamanists share in gross detail their experiences is beyond me. I hold strongly to the clause, “To keep silent”, or as Christian Sedman in Generation Hex puts it:

We could tell other people straight out, but of course the minute you talk about magic–the shit you’ve turned into gold–is the minute it turns back into shit.

But hey, at this point you’re thinking “Well hey Solo, you do write about magic, right? Yes I do. I love doing so. I want to inspire people, or at least shoot out that signal flare out there that yes, there is someone else out there who isn’t doing this for wholly selfish reasons, or to find some sort of crutch for an inadequate life. Sedman goes on to say:

Sometimes you can write about it. That kind of works. The best thing you can do with something you’ve written about magic, I think, is inspire somebody else enough to try it themselves, so that they can see for themselves.

Even within the paradigm of magic and the animistic, there is so much people aren’t seeing, and it can be frustrating. I try not to waste too much time myself though. I am too constantly involved in the magical and animistic world to always pause enough to write about it or network or “do business”. Or, perhaps it’s too involved in me.

The Ponies of Assateague, and Connecting With Totems

On Sunday I had a close encounter with the ponies of Assateague Island National Seashore. In one incident, a palomino pony came very close to the car, and I was able to stroke its mane briefly. The second incident occurred near the island’s visitor center, were my fiancee and I were able to watch a small family unit of a brown male, female and a male foal graze on the lawn outside the parking lot. The foal came up real close to me, and I was able to stroke his forehead briefly. We spent some time sitting on the lawn observing them. They seemed very unconcerned with our presence, at peace with the land and with the naked apes watching them. One could say I’m an ass in that I shouldn’t be touching wild animals–and to be honest, that’s the big rule I keep that I ended up breaking. If it wasn’t for the ponies initiating the contact, I probably would have (and still should have?) kept my hands to myself.

This got me thinking about a couple of things, though. First was the meaning and message behind these ponies. I’ve seen them off and on for most of my life, ever since I started traveling to the coast with my family as a small child and could consciously remember doing so. They seemed to me to be like the mythical hippocampus, a union between land and sea. They were also elusive. Some days you’d visit the island and travel the whole length of it, not seeing a pony in sight. Another time you’d see several, and they would sit on the side of the road, some of them waiting for cars to slow down, habituated by unscrupulous visitors trying to feed them. They were trusting, sometimes to a fault. They also reminded me of endurance, perseverance. They’ve adapted to that island since they came there in the 1600s, most likely from a sunken Spanish vessel off the coast. Marooned on foreign land, they’ve made the best of the situation, and flourished.

The other thing that got me thinking was that I had always taken the island for granted, with the easy access I’ve had to it. In fact, I’ve had many experiences in my life were I could have direct interaction with many different types of animals in many settings. My totemic work reflects this strongly, and generally I can’t seem to understand, nor relate with, people who write long and intricate totem dictionaries of animals they’ve had no personal interaction with. There is the issue of globalization, but there is also the issue of old school. The animistic cultures and societies of the past built their totemic view of animals by direct personal experience, interaction, and sharing the environment with these animals. This seems to be a very different tack from many of the totemists of today, who base most of their views on wildlife books and programs, and UPG. Now, there isn’t anything wrong with that in itself, but it really opens up a whole new world when you take that extra effort to see the animal in person, even if it’s just in a zoo (although zoo animals tend to display atypical behavior, you can still learn a lot about an animal by observing even the abnormal behaviors.)

I’m a bit spoiled in that I’ve had the opportunity to work in veterinary clinics, pet retail, wildlife centers, parks, in addition to living close to numerous parks, refuges, zoos, museums and other places were one can seek a more personal connection with the natural world. Not everyone has this sort of access. It’s something I need to remember, and maybe have patience with, when interacting with fellow totemists. The thing I have a problem with is those who write totem dictionaries disseminating information about an animal that is incorrect from a biological standpoint, and from a symbolic standpoint it completely flies in the face of what is otherwise known about the animal. That is something I have a problem with. To spread misinformation, even unintentionally, just isn’t cool. People need to be more mindful.

I think what needs to be done is to call attention to these errors, and encourage people to seek more direct experience with the wilderness around them. Even if you live in the middle of the city, nature survives somewhere.

I guess it’s something I’m still rolling around in my head.

Shells, and other things

The Symbolism of the Cowrie Shell

I visited the coast this weekend, trying to get away from some of the stress of home. Amidst the tacky, tourist-trap gift shops, one could find many stores selling a wide variety of seashells and other related things from the ocean. I developed an intense attraction and desire to pick up cowry shells, and ended up coming home with a whole big bag of them, mostly cypraea moneta and cypraea annulus. Now, I aware of the basic nature by which cowries were appreciated by the Egyptians, and I had planned on picking up a few for my practices. As it turns out, I find that cowries have so many other meanings, associations and uses–some of which I find rather synchronistic and fortuitous to parts of my current situation.

Ah, the interesting things in life.

In any case, I plan on updating a little more on my trip, because a close encounter with feral ponies has served to remind me of certain thoughts on totemism I wish to express. I’d also like to address some good points and some thoughts that a few others made in my last post at some point.

Falling Apart, Coming Back Together

Last weekend I had a very nice conversation with Lyssa, Bryce, and my fiancee about the shamanic path and the issue of trauma. Mainly this would refer to the propensity I’ve seen of some shamanists to be very loud and open about their traumatic pasts and experiences–as if that very thing is an automatic badge for being a shaman or taking on the shamanic path. Bryce hit the nail right on the head when he mentioned that, in order to function, one needs to be able to put oneself back together again. Or, be allowed to be put together again. This sort of thing has been evidenced time and time again across numerous traditions and mythologies.

Being put back together indicates being able to be a contributing member of society. If you cannot interact with people in your own society, how do you expect to interact socially with the peoples and beings of other realms? Also–if you cannot fix yourself or are broken and are unable or unwilling to fix yourself or be fixed, how do you expect to help or heal others on your shamanic path? This only reinforces my view that not everyone who takes on the shamanic path really should, or is able or capable of doing so. Not everyone who has suffered severe trauma in their lives are able to handle this sort of thing. They may even have the energy or power, but no knowledge on how to control or use it. Think a gun in the hands of a toddler. Now granted, some of them may grow up (aka, pull their heads out of their asses) to be skilled sharpshooters, but more often than not all they’ll end up doing is blowing someone else’s head off, or their own.

To some degree this can be blamed on the culture and society we live in–that we don’t have the elders or the people around to address the psychological as well as the spiritual needs of these people, to teach them how to handle the power they’ve been given. To follow a shamanic path is to be in the realm of the psychological as well as the spiritual. But, to another degree this can also largely be blamed on the ignorance of people who are unable or unwilling to take that much-needed step after experiencing the proverbial bitchslap. They do not wish to go beyond the finely-woven comfort zones they have built for themselves. It would be much easier to sit on your online journal and collect *hugs* and sympathy, for example.

Now, before people blast me for being an insensitive prick (which, I do admit, I’ve been guilty of before), allow me to say this. When I mention ‘being fixed’, that does not mean that there are no scars, no seams, no pain of the past lingering. I myself get fairly pissed off when people tell me I just need to “get over it”. Some things you never get over. Some things just stay with you, even fuck you up on occasion. And that’s okay. But what do you do with that pain? That’s the big question. When the shaman is dismembered by the spirits, he or she is usually given extra parts or modified parts in the process of being pieced back together. What are the special gifts you’ve been given as a result of these experiences? How do you adapt to the hand that was dealt you? What was given to you to help you compensate or cope? How about helping others?

I know I posted this before, but Jarandhel’s post Spiritually On-Call is another good rant to look at relating to this topic. I actually have much more to say in relation to this, but it may have to wait for further posts, as I need to run off soon and deal with a work-related crisis. Oof.

The Rat King

To me, New York means rats.

I first visited New York back in 2001, just a month prior to the events of September 11th. Rats have been visiting me symbolically and most heavily in my dreams many months before. Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve experienced both in the same year, or maybe it’s because NYC is considered the rat mecca of the country that I associated the two together in the first place.

The curious thing about it all is that I have never once seen a wild rat, the primary focus of my obsession, before my most recent trip to the Big Apple. Since ‘01 I began keeping domestic specimens of R. Norvegicus, an animal that is as different from the wild rat as a dog is from a wolf, but like the two, still possessing numerous similarities in trait and character. The pitter-patter of little rodent feet traveled from the realm of my dreams into my physical habitat. Somehow it wasn’t quite enough though. Something continued to gnaw incessantly on the periphery of my consciousness.

My most recent trip to NYC happened in mid-February of this year, roughly ten days after the death of my four-year old rat Mina, and roughly a week after the arrival of my fiancee from Germany. Throughout the trip I recounted the long legacy of rats (mostly all female), and the lessons they’ve taught me. I can say with the utmost confidence that any animal, however small, that comes into your life can change it forever. Mina certainly did. But in their own way they all did.

We stood on the subway platform, my fiancee and my parents and younger brother, killing time and waiting for the next train to arrive after a brief delay. I was zoning out, staring into the rails below. It was a long day with lots of walking, and I was exhausted. Suddenly, a portion of the sludgy grayness below jumped to life and began to move, darting suddenly across my vision. I blinked once, then twice, until I realized what I was looking at. It was a wild rat. I took off running down the platform alongside it, snapping pictures on my iPhone, and watching as a second and then a third appeared, prancing along the rails.

The Rat King finally decided to reveal himself.

The mythical Rat King has one of two origins. The first and more folkloric origin of a ‘rat king’ is when a bunch of rats become connected by their tails, and end up growing together. These mostly involve black rats.

There is yet a more contemporary and postmodern take on the rat king, one reported by municipal workers, police officers, exterminators, and many others. The Rat King in the postmodern age is an exceptionally large male rat, one commonly seen leading a pack of other rats.

From a postmodern shamanistic perspective, to me the Rat King represents the all-encompassing rat totem. The Big Rat.

To work with the Rat King is to work with an agent of balance and in-betweenness. In the West, poverty, the slums and misfortune are associated with rats. Poor housing. Disease–the rat was considered the main transmitter of the plague in Europe in the Middle Ages. In the East, when the rice harvest was good and the stores were full, people found rats. They symbolized abundance, wealth and plenty. While visiting the Chinatown district of NYC, my fiancee gifted me with a statue featuring a golden rat, seated upon a bed of coins, and surrounded by baby rats. A very classic and common figure of the rat in Eastern symbolism.

Two sides of the same coin. Balance and rhythm. Family, community, survival and persistence. Knowing and appreciating your origins. Where you are and where you are going.

This will be a first in a series of posts on my dealings with the Rat King, as well as rat symbolism and other related totemic and animistic information on things rat.

The Thoughts of an Info-Hound

Getting high is information gathering, staying high is the result of transmuting information into living experience.

~Antero Alli, Angel Tech

This quote is oh, so true on so many levels. It’s one of the reasons why I have such an intense bibliophilia, and an intense love of gathering information in general. The sort of high I get when I discover something new, and then apply that sort of information, is in a way how I connect closely to Thoth/Djehuty, my Teacher and my Guide. A gnosis of word and thought and, blossoming from that, desire.

I think I’ll start making posts of inspirational quotes, or just ones I happen to dig.

Drive-by Coyote-musings

If Coyote taught me anything in my life, it’s to never be a specialist. Being a jack-of-all trades has its benefits, and it’s much easier to avoid stagnation and being stuck in a rut. Coyotes themselves aren’t specialists, they are immensely flexible creatures both genetically as well as socially and intellectually. They can function in small packs or large, or completely solitary. They can scavenge, they can hunt. They can adapt to almost any environment. The pressures put on them by humans and the ever-changing environment around them only seem to aid in their transformation. They are indeed a very alchemical creature.

There are advantages to being a specialist, just as there are advantages to being a jack-of-all-trades. Just compare a hunting coyote to a hunting jaguar (which, the two do share overlapping territories in South America and formerly states like Arizona and New Mexico) and you can see which one is the more specialized hunter. However, there are also advantages to adapting oneself in multiple areas at once–of the two animals, which one happens to be endangered, and which one thrives despite the pressures put upon it? I’m going to throw the breaks on this metaphor for now though, because it dances dangerously close to lauding one totem over another, which is certainly not my intention nor my focus.

Steering back on track, my focus here is that, as a totem, teacher and even godform, Coyote has taught me that it doesn’t benefit me to stay in ruts. This is especially true of my magical and shamanic practice. Sticking to the tenets of my primary totem, I always make sure to keep myself constantly flexible, so that I’m able to evolve and adapt my practice, and my mind, as often as possible.

Shamans Pray For Election

From Technoccult:
Peruvian Shamans Pray For US Election

You know, maybe its just me, but somehow this election seems to have the most occult references. Between Palin getting protection from witchcraft, to right-wing dominionist Christians claiming Obama’s African family is performing acts of witchcraft on McCain, let alone these same nutjobs whipping themselves up in a fury of spiritual warfare and fanaticism, it does make me wonder. Like it or not, this election is definitely very spiritually charged. Not that it’s any surprise, given certain trends, but observing various patterns has proven to be quite intriguing.