30 December, 2016

Viewer Survey! My First Ever!

Greetings, dear Readers!

Now, you may not know this about me... but I'm the kind of person who REALLY LIKES SURVEYS. Frankly, I don't know why I haven't done one for my channel before. I've been thinking about it for years.

But today I finally sat down and made one! Demographics questions, YouTube audience questions, FUN questions, questions to get to know a little more about your lives and what you like and what you're interested in, what your experiences are, what your background is, and so on!

19 November, 2016

Snow Globe

It is Noon on a Saturday.

Everything is quiet. The cat sleeps soundly. The plants stretch toward the window glass. Blankets drape effortlessly. Pillows hunch together for warmth. The light, diffused, soft, comforting.

You'd never know the world was falling apart.
In our heads, in our hearts.

The snow that silently fell outside this morning gave everything the feeling of living inside a snow globe. Only the snow is outside. We live in the dollhouse within the glass bubble, crafted by the hand of an unseen artisan. And that's no metaphor for Creation. Do not be confused.

The world outside is tilted.
Is it the bubble, knocked off its base on the mantle of the gods, that skews the outside? Or is it the outside world itself that leans and veers off somewhere we can't see from here, whence the wind comes?

The snow has already gone. Melted. The Sun, though weak today, is still the Sun.
The quiet is broken. People stomp overhead. Who are our neighbors in this Doll's House?

Who will be the first to walk out, and slam the door?


-C-

03 November, 2016

Spells of the Broken

As a person who has a problem with attachment to things, I typically get very upset when things break.

Very. Upset.

However. I am also a Witch, and one who believes in magick, signs, and messages. So when I opened my glasses case and one of the clay talismans I made this year at Pagan Pride--which was put in a glasses case for protection from breaking--was BROKEN... I was initially very upset. This one came out the best, and I was very proud of it. But when I realized that the only one that had broken was the one that had actually been made with an intention, I started to think its breaking was perhaps the completion of its purpose.

Odd, I thought, since I hadn't even had time to sit with it and "do" anything.

Its creation was its onset, though. It's been a couple of months. So here's what we have. Now I'm just working out what it is that's come to pass...

Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust.

Blessings~
-C-

09 October, 2016

Purpose

Hey, Readers,

It's been a minute.

If you haven't been keeping up with my YouTube channel, you may not know what's been going on with me. And if you have, you haven't heard the latest things, because I haven't shared any of that yet. But it will come.

Things are different. There are good days and bad days, good weeks and not as good weeks, as always.

I think I know what I'm meant to be doing next.

But it's terrifying. As all these shifts are, and have been, and will be.

That's how I know it's right.

It's hard work. It's deep work. But it's important work, to me. To others. To the world.

I'm not sure how much I can say about it right now, other than that I'm excited, and scared, and anxious, and doubtful, and confident, and I just sincerely hope that when I am ready to begin and put it out there, that my work will be met with enthusiasm and support.

You have all been so delightfully good to me over the years. This is something that will give back... if only I can remove the blockage of monstrosity and step forward, despite fear.


Blessings upon you, may the Spirits be fair.
-C-

04 April, 2016

Goddess Worship, Archaeology edition

When people confuse matriarchy with misandry, archaeology edition...

Hey, Readers,

I'm rereading The Spiral Dance by Starhawk and got to the part where she discusses that people say Goddess worship always included human sacrifice in a literal sense (as opposed to the symbolic sacrifice of burning poppets, etc), but archaeological evidence does not support this. She lists several sites determined to be home to matrilineal cultures where Goddess imagery was common, yet no evidence of human sacrifice was present.


One of the sites named was Çatalhöyük or Catal Hüyük, where she notes that many figures depicting the Goddess and animals were found, but there are no provisions for human or animal sacrifice. Not knowing much about Çatalhöyük, I decided to look it up and read a bit. 

09 February, 2016

Restricted Practice / Craft Without STUFF

Hey, Readers,

Someone asked me about a topic I know I've talked about in the past: Restricted practice of the variety where you live in a household with people who aren't welcoming toward Paganism, and maybe even won't allow any "trappings" of it in the house, whether this be Pagan books, crystals, incense, or even candles. To help them find where I've already talked about this, or the collab has, I went through my blog, YouTube channel, and the collab channel. I discovered that all the times I've talked about this have been on the PaganPerspective collab! I have no blog posts about this specific topic, nor have I talked about it much on my personal channel, at least not in specific. Probably I figured we talk about it on the collab every so often, so there's no need to cover it on my channel, as well.

But I do think there's more to say and more specifics to be said, or ways I can update what I've said previously. So that is now on my list. But until then, I've compiled some links here to videos I've done on the subject, one video that one of my old substitutes on the collab (Sissors) did, and links to the PaganPerspective BLOG list where you can find links to all the videos done that week. So here are some past resources to check out until I get to doing some new stuff!

26 January, 2016

Unflinching Heart / Thank You

Hey, Readers,

I didn't set out to write a blog post tonight. I just started writing a little update on Facebook and it turned into a much longer post--longer than a status but perhaps shorter than a blog post--so I decided to instead publish it here. That's what I have a blog for, right? =)

About halfway through this status update-turned-blog, I realized that I was doing the work I began last weekend at a Priestessing Skills (read: Leadership Skills, of a Priestessing nature) workshop. But you all don't know about that yet. I don't know if you will, explicitly. This one may just be revealed to you in my leadership, in my priestessing. But I will tell you that it was working with acknowledging our fears about leadership, and with letting go of the idea of "perfection" in leadership. So without further adieu, here are the thoughts that sprang from my head, fully formed, before my fingers knew what they were typing.

02 January, 2016

My 2015 Lessons, My 2016 Intention

"What is Your Intention?" asks Thorn Coyle's blog post from a few years ago. I haven't thought much about a single intention for this new calendar year yet, so I'd like to do that, now. Though the whole "Yuletide" season (which for me begins slightly before the Winter Solstice and extends slightly past the change of the Gregorian calendar year) feels like a shift into a new chapter for me, I did feel a significant change in this year's New Year's Eve into New Year's Day, January the 1st of 2016.