Category Archives: Spirituality

Pride

Our level 3 students led a fabulous ritual yesterday, aided by four brave level 2 students. My new favourite must-have ritual tool is a shredder. (You just had to be there.)

I enjoyed the afternoon immensely. For once I wasn’t stressed out about packing too much into the day, so I could relax and actually appreciate the school ritual. Before the rit, I was cornered by two of my level 3s so that they could apologise for the chaos of the oils & incense class two weeks ago. I tried to reassure them, reminded them that I was ill that weekend, pointed out that there’s a reason why making oils and incenses are supposed to be held in two separate classes; but they insisted that no, the class as a whole has to remember that the teachers have a ton of information that we’re trying to get across to them in a limited amount of time, and that class isn’t a social event or a place to kick back and relax. By the end, they had convinced me. (They weren’t going to take no as an answer anyway, so it’s a good thing I agreed.)

See, I believe that class does have a social aspect to it, and that it is a time to relax a bit while being focused. However, these students do have an excellent point: there has to be a balance between the enjoyable aspect and the discipline and respect necessary to work within a time frame and with educators.

So I’m very proud of all of my students this weekend, for a variety of reasons. My Saturday class hit upon a comprimise that allowed them to participate within discussion of modern religion at last, and it was fantastic; the ritual was marvellous; and there were several private exchanges on Sunday afternoon that impressed me with how mature and determined my students are.

And after it all, I got to spend a wonderful evening with my husband’s family. No one barbecues inch-thick pork chops with homemade sauce like my father-in-law!

Blue Monday

Yesterday started off so well, and gradually went further and further downhill as I overextended myself, thinking that this second spring cold was beaten. It didn’t help that we had a very high-energy hands-on class on making oils and incenses on Sunday afternoon, which resulted in trying to rein in eight excited adults, and ended with someone saying, “Well, this was a great class, except…”. I’m really tired of back-handed compliments. What’s wrong with saying, “I had a lot of fun. Thanks! By the way, next time could you give us a bit more warning? I really had to scramble to assemble the supplies for this.” I uncharacteristically physically turned around and walked away from the back-handed compliment because (a) it wasn’t my fault, and (b) I’d spent the past two hours repeating myself because not everyone was listening when I imparted the original information. I lost my patience. Passive-aggressive feedback does absolutely no good at all, and I wish more people understood that. It’s patronising and manipulative, and I see right through it. Coming from a student, no matter how they might think their five more years of age gives them an edge over their teacher, it’s even more insulting, both to me and to the student. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to realise that it damages them.

I missed a game last night because the afternoon’s class wore me out. I took an over-the-counter sleeping pill, stuck my earplugs in to counter the thumping bass from upstairs, and woke up eleven hours later. I have even less of a voice than I did when I went to bed, which is making me grumpy. I also discovered that the two hour TV program t! asked me to tape for him taped the wrong channel. I am not in a particularly great mood.

This weekend did have good bits, though: for example, we had a terrific dinner with Tal on Saturday night, where we made Ceri’s fabulous and eeeeeevil pudding. The second half of the Saturday class was fun to watch, after my whispered lecture on the very basic highlights of Mesoamerican, Mesopotamian, and Egyptian religion. (Note to self: your customary dynamism is completely sabotaged when you are forced to whisper, rendering the class lifeless and dull.) And I must say that the eleven hours of sleep last night were high up on the List of Good Things, considering my recent sleep scores, even if those eleven hours were drug-induced.

I have a Reiki workshop to attend tonight, to which I’m very much looking forward. And I think I’ll spend the day researching and making notes for this Brid project, which seems to be evolving into a dialogue between contemporary views of the Neo-Pagan goddess and the attributions found in achaeological and literary work.

At least, that was the plan until the manuscript for the second book in this ongoing series just fell into my inbox with the request to write a foreword attached. I work tomorrow, and they want it by Wednesday, so it looks like I’m working for the publisher again today, as I did every single day last week. (I know I swore that I was taking Friday off – I lied. I worked on checking the first half of the other manuscript that was sent back to me by the first author.)

I just keep telling myself that this book is atypical, and by the end of this week when I’ve checked the second half of those rewrites and sent it back to the publisher, it will all be over until I do a final galley read-through somewhere down the line.

All I want to do is curl up with a cat under an afghan, have someone bring me soup for lunch, and read books with my sticky tabs, a notebook, and a highlighter by my side. That’s all.

Invocation of DayQuil

Hail, powers of DayQuil, conqueror of sinus infections, cold, and flu.
I invoke the powers of Pseudoephedrine Hydrochloride, Dextromethorphan Hydrobromide, and blessed Acetaminophen.
With your might I banish infection and congestion, muscle ache and sore throat.
I invite the ability to breathe clearly and to edit a whole page of this manuscript without coughing so hard that I see spots.
For the good of all (and I really mean it), and with harm to none (because I wouldn’t wish yet another cold on anyone this spring),
So mote it be.

(Yeah, this wretched cold is courtesy of my husband, who feels appropriately guilty. Nothing’s stopping me from seeing the advance screening of Hellboy tonight, though — nothing, I tell you!)

God As A Fellow Artist

Surrealmuse takes a look at art in several different ways. Her subtitle was what really caught my attention: When the muse is alive in anyone, they become an inventive, searching, self-expressing creature.

I found this paragraph in Art & Spirituality:

I envision God as another fellow artist, the master artist with a touch of scientific knowledge, but an artist all the same. Who else but an artist would create such beautiful scenic beaches and mountains? With the same token, the dark side of God’s artistic vision is illustrated in the creation of angry, fiery volcanoes. But God also has a sense of humor, who else could create a platypus?

I thought that might get your attention. Enjoy the site, and think about how your own creativity conveys your spirituality.

Grr

Any time Philip Heselton’s Wiccan Roots wants to stop quoting and re-hashing Jack Bracelin’s 1960 bio of Gerald Gardner, it can go right ahead. I’d rather read something original than a secondary text. Heselton acknowledges in his foreword that Bracelin’s book is a key text and that he quotes frequently, but really, the first two chapters do nothing to advance the scholarship of the field. So far the analysis is weak and pointless, and it’s just a string of quotes from other books.

This book is supposed to be ground-breaking. I keep waiting for the ground-breaking part. I may only have finished two chapters, but readers are gained are lost through a first chapter alone.