Personal Alchemy

Alchemy is a concept that many of us are familiar with, even if only in passing. Alchemy is the refinement of base materials into something more useful -- traditionally a question of chemistry and used in apothecary applications, but also expanding into legend as a source of incredible power including the fabled ability to transform lead into gold. I don't fully buy into most of that. Much of what alchemy once represented has been supplanted by modern science and demystified by the knowledge of chemical compounds and the manufacture of both chemical medications and modern holistic medicine. We now know enough about alloys to understand that, in theory, one can take a lead based alloy and make it appear to be similar to gold, with the proper combinations, and we know that any sort of potions and elixirs were just clever uses of roots and herbs to stimulate the proper chemical responses in the human body.

The philosophical aspects, however, remain relevant, even today. Alchemy wasn't just a profession for chemists and medicine men, it was a way of life. The notion of changing one sort of matter into another was representative of our need for enlightenment. Indeed, this was the foundation of what motivated the pursuit of alchemy. Rather than being motivated by greed (a more modern view of turning lead into gold), alchemists were driven by the reward of seemingly limitless potential that awaited them in mastering their trade. That part of the concept isn't lost to us.

I try to walk the path of personal alchemy, in hopes of refining myself into something better. The prime motivator behind my current pursuit of artistic advancement, physical fitness, and meditative practices come back to that same path. By focusing on personal improvement as a philosophy, one should seek to shore up weaknesses; what made base materials in alchemy such an important part of the philosophy was that they were readily available and relatively worthless on their own. For me, my artwork has always been fairly one-dimensional and limited to a certain style and medium; I have pursued multiple other styles and media to broaden my potential, with varying degrees of success. I've never been in the best shape physically (to the point where I weighed 320 pounds at age 16), but I am currently in the best shape of my life, getting regular exercise and better nutrition. The meditation I'm still working on; not having the time to properly focus and relax makes it very difficult to master the technique.

Ultimately, I think this is a process that any belief system should be able to get on board with. We all have room for improvement, but we also have different paths to follow to get there. It's all a matter of figuring out what your weaknesses are and pursuing a way to compensate, be it through strengthening the weakness or finding another strength that can do the same job. This is, of course, very similar to the nature of self-help literature that can be found almost anywhere. The difference lies in the ultimate goal of the refinement of those weaknesses. The end goal isn't merely to shore up weaknesses and become a better person in the view of the world around you. The goal is a spiritual metamorphosis.

The process of performing personal alchemy is very much akin to that of turning lead into gold in the metaphysical sense, rather than the scientific sense of creating an alloy with similar properties. Rather than simply being a superficial improvement, the process pursues a change to the very core of your being. This is the entire notion of a genuine change; it isn't forced, it becomes a natural part of yourself, one so intrinsic that you no longer recognize that your former state was your own. You must leave the shell of your former self behind you and all of the baggage that comes with it. It's about abandoning the flaws that plague us.

I've by no means completed my journey on this path, and doubt that I ever will. With every weakness that I overcome, I discover others that I will have to turn attention to in the future. It's an ongoing process that is the ultimate life's work. Personal alchemy is not and will never be an easy path, but it is one that is rewarding and quite enriching at every turn. Flaws are part of being human, and no matter how far we may progress, they will remain a constant; what separates us from those limitations is our willingness to accept that those flaws exist and our dedication to proving that they can be overcome.

Fenris: Embracing the Dark Side

I'm going to go into something that can be a bit controversial in the pagan community. There's a lot of talk about white magic and black magic. Those who are willing to go a bit beyond the harmless prayers for protection or health and delve into a more selfish pursuit of their own interests -- often at the expense of others -- are said to be "on the left-hand path". Now these assertions are more commonly associated with Wicca and with pseudo-Christian offshoots (ie Satanism -- yes indeed, kiddies; if you as a Christian recognize Satan as an entity, you too are a polytheist!), but there are still some funny looks one gets as a traditional pagan for letting the darker side of the myths in.

A few months ago, however, I had a bit of a personal epiphany that I should have had a long time ago, and that I'm sure I'm not the only one who has reached. I was re-reading the Eddas, in particular the Ragnarok myth, and reflecting on the nature of Fenris. Here we have an entity who is half-divine and gifted with tremendous strength, bound by unbreakable restraints for his entire existence, and destined to bring the end to the established order. Fenris' destiny is to kill Odin, the lord of the Aesir who spared the wolf's life and ensured that he would survive long enough to do so, and to be slain in the process by another. I began to ponder, as I often do, on the nature of the "end of the world" myths in general, and saw the pattern once again in Ragnarok as with the Mayan and native-American traditions; the end is only temporary, as a new beginning will come soon after.

Yes, Fenris is indeed a grim entity. This dark force is necessary, however, to stimulate change. Without Fenris, the events of Ragnarok would ultimately leave the status-quo, with Odin remaining at the vanguard of the Aesir -- there would be no end-of-days, only a tragic rebuilding of the old world. However, I began to look upon society as a whole today. As the corruption flows through society, can one deny that we need a Fenris-aspect to bring about a change in the modern age? Obviously, I don't view it as a scenario where Odin would be the one to fall before the fangs; my more eclectic pagan view includes a healthy amount of respect for all world religions, if not for the churches associated with them. The simple reality is that the gods and goddesses of the old traditions are no longer a representative of the status-quo; the old ways are no longer insular, as we are no longer broken into regional tribes, but rather united as a global community. Indeed, a Fenris-aspect in modern times would suggest that it would be the fall of something more universally dominant. Be it the fall of overly-aggressive capitalism, socially confining class warfare, the subversive presence of the Christian church seeking to overwhelm American society, or any number of other corrupting influences, a change does indeed feel imminent.

I'm proud to add Fenris as one of my patron entities. I've gained a great deal of respect for him as a divine force, despite his opposition to Odin, and in some ways, I would say that I've grown to identify more with Fenris than any other at this point. Perhaps that is a factor of my own desire for change in recent months, but the wolf in unbreakable bonds should not be feared as he once was. The same goes for other seemingly sinister forces; names like Loki, Balor, Hades, Apep -- and yes, even Lucifer -- are not necessarily the enemy of humanity. Sometimes these antagonistic figures are simply that -- antagonists that urge us into action and provoke change for the good of us all.

So here's to embracing that darkness and accepting that the world is not all light. Walk the middle path, and do not become blinded by either.

Personal Totems

Following up on my previous post...

Choosing your totems is a deeply personal process and one open to interpretive selection. It may seem simple at first: look up the typical symbolism associated with the totem and see if the proverbial shoe fits. The reality is a bit more involved. What if your view on the totem is different from that held by the majority of the occult community? Does that make you wrong for seeing things in a different light? No; well, not as long as you can support your perspective with a well-thought out and well-reasoned answer. This is one of the many reasons not to concern yourself with seemingly cliched totem choices. Totemic spirits have gained that place in lore for a reason: these animals/beasts (as yes, even mythic beasts count as potential totems) serve a specific purpose that has made them important to humanity at one point or another. As an example, I'm going to share my own key totems and a bit on the reasons I've chosen them.

As a bit of a primer, I do feel that I should note that I've chosen my totems based on my ancestry. This isn't necessary, nor is it really relevant, but my spirituality being what it is, the link to tradition reinforces the bond. My totemic core connects to the heart of Irish myth with a healthy dose from the Norse influences that I've incorporated in recent years. Beyond that, I tend to use a more primal visual aspect when undergoing any sort of meditation, often going back to prehistory when possible. This is more a matter of personal preference; I do so as an effort to connect with a more or less pure state of the universe before humanity had a chance to start mucking it all up.

By far the most important totem for me is and has always been the corvidae, ravens and crows. Before I even started to really look into pagan traditions, these keenly intelligent and inquisitive birds fascinated me. As I took those first steps into the pagan path, they became far more important. As aspects of the Morrigan in Irish tradition (the goddesses Nemain and Babd both manifested as ravens) and as pets of Odin in the Norse tradition (Hugin and Mugin, memory and wisdom), the corvids are connected to both of my key patron gods (and in an odd coincidence, my name is an adaptation of the Welsh name for ravens; go figure). Not surprisingly considering the mythology, the corvid is a totem of the mind. These birds are among the most intelligent to be found, capable of mimicking speech, forming elaborate social bonds, and demonstrating impressive memory. For me, ravens and crows represent this primal sort of intelligence that we've lost touch with, one focused on survival and innovation without the niceties that we confine ourselves within. Ravens are very much the mental part of my totemic core, and one that I never leave behind; I wear a necklace that I've removed perhaps twice in the last year and a half with a simple silhouette of a raven on it for a reason, after all.

The second key totem is one that I never really connected with until recent shifts in my perspective. I never really associated myself with the wolf due to the cliches attached to them. Many of the more out-there types in the occult community, particularly when dealing with those who support the concept of a spirit-beast/animal-soul paradigm, default to the wolf as the standard (lycanthropy has its roots in Euro-descended cultures for a reason; sometimes the cliche makes sense, after all). In light of my newfound connection to the Fenris myth (which will likely be a future subject in its own right), the wolf has gained a higher importance for me as a totemic symbol. Much as the ancients did, I view the wolf as a predatory agent of change. The wolf, for me, is a dual-aspected symbol. On the one hand, the wolf is the lurker in the darkness, waiting for the weakened members of the herd to wander too far from the safety of numbers and become vulnerable -- the wolf encourages evolution through thinning out the weak, serving as a representative of survival of the fittest. On the other, the wolf represents the safety of the pack -- the fundamental reward of keeping in close with those you can trust and forming strong bonds with those who can shore up your own weaknesses with their strengths. This duality combines to perform both tasks at once, reminding you that not only do you need to refine your weaknesses, but you need to remember the value of others in supporting those weaknesses you've yet to overcome. The wolf is very much the spiritual component of my totemic core for that very reason.

That would seem to leave the physical aspect, eh? Most fitting from my totemic core for that would be the bull. Bulls are often associated with fertility and with agriculture, which is all well and good, but has nothing to do with why I connect with them. For me, the bull is a symbol of the warrior ideal. Warriors, as I see them, should be calm and accommodating when at peace, but ready to unleash their full destructive fury when pressed. Bulls present that same potential. By and large, the bull in the wild spends its life grazing in the fields and striving to avoid falling prey to predators, while its domestic counterparts have served dutifully as work animals and provide great nourishment. When forced to action, however, bulls can be as fierce as any beast and easily remind us of their incredible strength. This, to me, is far more valuable than any sort of devotion to the tiger or lion (more aggressive, predatory physical totems) as it has a much more accessible relation to daily life. What good is great strength in a society where using it would make you either intolerable or a mere brute? Far better to build that strength in the off-chance it may be needed and to be able to defend oneself as a last resort. I suspect that in a different age, I may have chosen differently here; hundreds of years ago, in the age of the sword, one would do very well to invoke the lion. Perhaps it is a sign of humanity's domestication of itself that selecting a beast of burden would make so much sense.

There are, of course, others that I find valuable. The Irish Elk is a strong candidate, as is the great bear. Dragons are, in all honesty, a bit too versatile for my liking as a totem, though they are excellent for heraldry and iconography. Perhaps more than any other aspect of esoteric pagan belief, totemic thinking is an interpretive art and your mileage may vary. Ultimately, you just have to sort out what is most important and most relevant to your needs.

A Totemic State of Mind

Symbolism is a very powerful thing for pagans of all stripes (and for nearly every other religion). The various gods and goddesses, and other divine and semi-divine figures, all draw upon symbolic representations in their associated mythologies. After all, what could be more iconic than Thor's hammer, the triquetra knot, or the Eye of Horus? We've grown accustomed to these symbols as iconography, and we know what to expect from these images. We've come to expect those symbols as part of our cultural identities.

This iconography extends far beyond the gods and the divine, however. Something that has grown increasingly relevant to my own spirituality is the concept of totems, spiritual symbols of qualities or concepts that one seeks to draw strength from and to emulate in their day to day life. I used to be highly dismissive of the idea of something like having a "spirit animal", and to an extent I'm still hesitant to fully accept the notion the way that others do; I think there's a lot of distance to cover between regarding these totems as symbols and the idea of a spirit beast or even the "animal-soul" ideas of some subcultures. The idea of a totem on the other hand, is a very powerful concept with a great history across several cultures.

Now, just to clarify that last bit: Spirit guides are one thing, spirit animals and animal-souls are another matter entirely. Spirit guides are a bit closer to the totemic concept, but show up more as a meditative tool -- they come into the subconscious during times of reflection to bring a symbolic sort of path out of the proverbial mental fog. Spirit animals/animal-souls, meanwhile, are more along the lines of people who believe that they were born infused with the spirit of a certain animal -- rather than merely admiring what the animal represents, they seek to emulate the animal to the extent of assuming it as part of their identity. This can sometimes go far beyond any sort of spirituality, and frankly I consider it more of a corruption of the totem concept that takes the idea too far; emulating the symbol is one thing, attempting to assimilate it is another all together.

Now, it's fairly obvious how totems originated. To the ancients, nature was much, much more immediate than it is for us. They lacked the separation created by modern comforts, and the hunt was less of a past-time and more urgent. Animals held a far greater sort of relevance to them, and as a result, the ancients imparted a deep, intimate sort of symbolism to the idea of these animals. Looking more at the ecology of the northern hemisphere, two of the main recurring totems are fairly predictable: the stag and the wolf.

Deer, elk, caribou, and other animals of that "stag" archetype were an essential part of the environment. The hunt provided food to eat, leather for clothing, bones for tools and trophies, and myriad other boons to the hunters. Most cultures came to revere the stag for this reason; even though they preyed upon the animals, they respected how important those animals were to their own continued existence. Stag become a totem of vitality and survival, representing strength and the providence of nature (often personified with horned gods like Cernunnos and Herne that, among other things, represented the hunt). Wolves and their ilk, on the other hand, served to remind the ancients that despite all of man's tools, nature still held many dangers that could threaten us. They came to represent the predator and, indirectly, the indomitable aspect that warriors sought to have, they served as rivals and antagonists to our survival and drove us to become better hunters (personified most notably in Fenris, the great wolf-god that would ultimately devour Odin).

A truly totemic viewpoint will incorporate multiple totems (one of the shortcomings I find in the animal-soul idea is the exclusion of other totems -- you lose a considerable amount of potential by overlooking what other totems can bring you). Ultimately it comes to a respect of the natural order and an understanding of how that order is maintained or was intended to be maintained. It's easy to lose touch with that natural aspect in the modern era as distant as most of us have come from that intimate connection that the ancients had. We aren't dependent on the wilderness for our survival, we're dependent on the grocery store. We don't need to revere and respect the predators to stay alive, we have our locked homes and cities for that, and only have to worry about other people. We've grown far from our roots. Thinking in a totemic mode brings us closer to those roots and reconnects us to our true nature.

It's that time of year.

For many of the people around me, this is indeed, as the song says, the "most wonderful time of the year". Everyone celebrates some holiday or another, but I don't really see the point.

I work retail, so I have to deal with Christmas whether I want to or not. As a card carrying, Catholic-church-hating pagan, I despise the holiday. I'm aware of its roots, and that makes it worse, honestly. So much of Christmas was blatantly stolen from pagan traditions, and even though that should make it easier to brush off the taint of would-be cultural genocide, it instead becomes more offensive. This holiday, as with Easter, is a reminder of what tools were used to subjugate the ancients. I'm sure that in many ways, I take this way too seriously, but even celebrating Yule seems to have lost its meaning for me. The holidays have been corrupted for me, but ultimately, I can accept that. I'm not fond of holidays anyway, for various other reasons (Samhain is the only one that I really celebrate, other than the equinoxes and solstices), mostly because the things we're celebrating should be honored every day, and not just on that one.

Holidays are artificial to me. They feel like forcible suggestions of things that we never really forgot, and that somehow excuse ignoring that part of our world the rest of the year. We shouldn't need a day to celebrate the beginning of winter and the beginning of the world recovering from the cold, we should celebrate each step along the way. We shouldn't need a day to celebrate the harvest, we should celebrate the bounty of nature throughout the entire growth and harvest cycle. People like to talk about "the reason for the season", but the reason is all around us at all times of year, and it sure as hell isn't the birth of a charismatic man in Jerusalem. It's the cycle of nature, waxing and waning from vibrancy in the summer to its slumber in the winter.

So until a time comes when a holiday really means something, I'll just keep going through the motions as nature does the same.

The Golden Age, Upheaval, and Change

There is a recurring theme of the Golden Age in most mythologies surrounding the time before the fall of the old order.  What constitutes the old order can vary widely: to the Greeks it was the act of Prometheus stealing fire and delivering it into the hands of man, to the Norse it was the period following the end of Ragnarok, the Hindu have a 5000 year cycle (the Maha Yuga) with recurring Golden Ages that require a tearing down of their "iron age".  This extends even to the Abrahamic traditions with Adam and Eve being cast out of Eden for partaking of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil.

This Golden Age often alludes to nature being incredibly bountiful, providing everything that humanity could wish for and more.  There is a pronounced presence of the otherworldly.  In many cases, the gods dwelt in the same realm as mankind.  In Greece, Pan served as a mentor in Arcadia, living amongst his students in the trees.  The Eden myth is almost ubiquitous, depicting a paradise where the Abrahamic God resided alongside his creation.  The upheaval and fall of the old order always brings this Golden Age to an end, and humanity is left to struggle with the wilderness in a new and harsh environment, fraught with conflict, etc; you know the drill from there.

This is ultimately one of the myths that leads me to my unified theory about the myths and legends.  It is far from the only overlap (I'll likely discuss some of them at another date), but this is a rather striking point.  This Golden Age would imply that not only were the myths of the gods true, but might also imply the same for other myths and legends.  It is widely accepted that in the post-mythological era, magic and monsters are a thing of the past (albeit, this is an acceptance that took quite a while to be complete), at least in the sense that mythology demonstrates.  Depending on one's outlook, myth has either always been just stories, or a thing of the past.  The recurrence of the Golden Age concept seems to suggest the latter in my opinion; though it has little to no bearing on the present, the idea that this multi-culture spanning concept could stand as an example of where -- or rather when -- these legends originated seems like too great of a coincidence.

Most of these myths appear to be parallel to each other.  The numbers may not be reliable in any sense of the word, nor would they suggest anything remotely resembling the Golden Age returning any time soon, but the idea of a returning cycle seems to make sense.  Symbols of eternity are rampant throughout mythology, and much as the seasons themselves, humanity's path seems to move in a repeating circle.  The notion of falling and returning to this paradise, to this utopia of a Golden Age doesn't seem so far fetched when one considers how far we must fall and how quickly we climb in our scientific pursuits.

And yet, that poses another question, more philosophical in nature than theoretical contemplation of mythologies: If humanity flows through cycles of time, rising and falling to and from a Golden Age paradise, are we in our current path ascending or crashing down to earth?

12 Days 'til Samhain

My favorite time of year is just around the corner, and I for one can't wait.  Most of the people I know get excited about Christmas, regardless of whether they're Christian or not, but for me, this is the big one. Always has been, really.  At least, it has been since I grew out of the "Look at all these presents!" stage (which, probably not coincidentally, was well after I grew out of the "Catholicism isn't so bad" stage).

I was never really one to celebrate holidays, and I'm still not huge on it.  This time of year, that mindset really hits home.  Thanksgiving is up next, and I find that pointless, since we should be giving thanks every day for what we have in our lives.  Setting aside a single day to give thanks and treating that as something special just seems silly to me.  Obviously, I don't celebrate Christmas aside from how it affects friends and family members that do; in fact, I'm the only member of the family that has fully separated from that belief system so far as to abandon the religious holidays.

Samhain, however, has always held a special place in my heart.  Even as a child when I stuck with calling it Halloween, Samhain was one of my favorite times of year.  Part of it comes from my morbid sense of humor, since it's a time where skulls and bats become par for the course, but as I've explored my own spirituality, the deeper reasons have become more clear.  Samhain is a time associated with a thinning of the veil between the living and the Otherworld, brought about in part by nature's decline toward dormancy where the wilderness wanes and supplies become scarce.  It's an echo of an older time, of course, but one that still has meaning.  We may not be facing a winter where we have to sit on our personal supply stores and ration out food and drink until spring, but we still see the wax and wane of the wilderness; that ebb and flow that thins the veil is still well within our reach.

I'm not going to get into whether that veil really exists or not, or whether it thins or not, or any of those other questions here.  That's something that can be debated for days on end without reaching a definitive outcome.  The important thing is the metaphor behind the veil.  This is a time of remembrance and reflection.  This is a time to honor your ancestors and take into consideration all that has come to pass in the prior year.  This is a time of celebration of what nature has provided us.  Most of all, this is a time to meditate and prepare on the year ahead.