....and we're back!  So, after a two-week hiatus, I think that I can back on track with study. For a while, I had thought about putting it aside and wait until I was more mentally prepared, but Mary gave me a good idea: to set aside at least 10-15 minutes each day, using a timer, even, in order to do just a little bit of study.  Some of the days exercises are somewhat intimidating, and that has kept me from performing them, but Mary's advice will hopefully make it less daunting.  I will definitely give that a try and see if I can get back into the mindset of study.

It's difficult to believe, but not all-too surprising, that I haven't seriously updated in over a week.  I tried to update on Sunday, but nothing really came of that.  There's been quite a bit of emotional upheaval the past week or so in my personal and professional spheres, most recently being struck by a car while riding my bicycle this past Monday; my thanks to the powers that be, since all that was injured was my ankle.  I'm taking this as a sign to slow down and to not forgot about my own health and wellness aside in favor of another's, which can be so easy to do when you're making a career out of helping people.

As a result of being so drained, I haven't felt the inclination to continue with study, but I can feel starting to creep back; tonight I'll try to do the magical pass for the maiden, pretty much where I left off in the book.  Next week, we'll skip ahead and learn about Lammas, which is August 1.

Week 3

Starting this week, we're learning about the god and goddess, the divine energy split into male and female forms.  I feel that I express more of the feminine energy, but I do sense some masculine energy and would like to be more comfortable in expressing it.  The next couple weeks will concern the three aspects of the goddess: the maiden, the mother, and the crone.  I don't really have that much to say tonight, but I will say that I look forward to exploring these aspects.

Conclusion to Week 2...

....so I have not yet tried the moonwalking or sunwalking, or Roderick's guided meditation. I think that I will try the moonwalking tonight, the first night I have had to myself in almost a week. And honestly, his guided meditation sounded silly when I read through the text, so I decided that I would not do it. In place of it, I have downloaded some guided meditations from iTunes and will listen to them this week. 

With that out of the way, the entry for Day 14 asked us to consider our learned perceptions of God. Roderick gave the following questions to think about:

• What images of god did you hold as a child?
• How have these childhood images influenced your understanding of the divine today?
• Are the images of god that you know actually representative of god's fundamental nature?
• Are images of god important? Why?
• What is the purpose of believing in deity?
• Do we cheat ourselves at any level by characterizing god through image? Why?
• Does it bother you to see the word 'god' not capitalized in this book? Why?
• Does the word 'god' need capitalization?
• What automatic, conditioned responses do you have in relation to words, letters, and grammatical formalities?

Being raised Catholic, God was never personified; he was always this nebulous, invisible presence, and Jesus was his physical representative on Earth.  The images of God that I can remember are those from popular media and Michaelangelo's Sistine Chapel, in the panel "The Creation", all of which portray him as an old white man with a long beard.  They never really had any kind of influence on how I perceive the divine, having been exposed to many different world religions.  In a way, I still perceive divinity as a creative force, invisible yet perceptible.

Images of gods are important in that they help strengthen a person's beliefs.  It can be difficult to believe in a deity if you cannot see it, so you create an image physically or in your mind so that you become closer to it.  Most humans have an inherent need to believe in something greater than themselves, to understand how and why they were created.  We aren't cheating ourselves by creating images, because we often characterize gods in our own image, whether Caucasian, African, or Asian.  By showing that the gods look like us, it is saying that we carry a bit of the divine in us.

It only bothers me that 'god' is not capitalized when someone is talking about it in the Biblical sense because that is what I have always been taught.  I'm somewhat of a stickler for grammar, but I realize there is a limit to what I will correct and that I'm always willing to learn.

In Roderick's "Word to the Wise" for Day 14, he says this, which I found to be a little upsetting: 

In Wicca, the divine is not a person, nor is the divine something that is "greater than" each of us.  Wiccans view the divine as an energy that manifests through us at all times.  It is who and what we are.  In addition to that, it is a good practice to begin deconstructing and closely observing cultural customs that incite emotional or mechanical reactions.

It may simply my own attitudes and preconceived notions, but I feel that Roderick comes off somewhat aloof or detached when he talks about Wicca.  For me, the divine, the energy of the universe, is greater than us, but not so great that we can't understand it.  I take it very personally when someone tries to tell me what to believe; it's all a part of my needing to be in control.  I do not discount, however, the idea that my perceptions will change by the end of this year of study; in fact, I count on it.

Week 2

Survived my first week into Wicca, the first of many, and onto the second, which deals with meditation.  This concept is integral to the study of Wicca, as well as to leading a healthy and balanced life.  Yesterday, we were asked to consider two different methods of meditation, Eastern and Western, and to see which best suits our personality by answer the following questions.

Do you like your life to be perfectly organized or do you not mind a bit of chaos?

Do you respond to most queries with action or with contemplation?

Are you active and mobile, or are you laid back and sedate?

Do you believe that every question has a definite, logical answer, or do you think that questions can sometimes beget more questions?

Are you naturally internally focused or externally focused?

Are you naturally patient or not?

Are you strong-willed, decisive, and direct?  Or are you easy-going and more indirect in your approach to people and tasks?

I find that I lean more towards the Eastern style of meditation, being more laid back, easy-going, and internally focused.  So much of the day is spent thinking and moving that I enjoy being able to simply sit quietly breathing or chanting a mantra.  The Western style of meditation has the same goal, but uses imagery and guided meditation to accomplish it.  I've not yet tried guided meditation, but this week will give me the opportunity to try it out and see how it works.

Today was spent simply learning to breathe.  Most of us, myself included, take this action for granted, something that happens automatically while we're out living our lives.  It takes time to sit and notice how we're breathing and to learn to take slow, deep breaths.  This is something that I learned during massage school, to ground and center myself by taking deep breaths and quieting the mind.  As the book states, I can use this whenever I feel stressed or unfocused to re-align my thoughts and emotions.  Breathing keeps us alive, it only makes sense that we should learn to do it well!

The all-important question:

There have been a lot of new beginnings for me in the past few months: new career, new apartment, new band, new boyfriend....all of which demand so much of my time (let's not forget studying for the national certification, I haven't even begun to start that).  We add to all that the study of a new religion.  Something, it seems, has to give.  But I'm determined to see this through; all of these new beginnings help teach me about myself, about limitations and time management, about being able to say 'no'.  It's been frustrating, the last day I have had off from work was Friday the 13th (not kidding) and I will welcome this upcoming vacation.

Back to the subject: part of this week's exercises, appropriately, is to contemplate our reasons for choosing to study Wicca.  For a long time, I've felt this emptiness caused by my lack of spirituality.  Even as a child, I couldn't identify with Western religions and later felt drawn to religions like Buddhism.  After learning a little about Wicca from Mary and Natalie, I felt that it might help to strengthen my spirituality and my relationship with nature.  I may not end up following Wicca at the end, but I won't dismiss it as a possibility.

I've come to realize that I don't like to follow directions exactly as someone else has laid them out, but at the same time, I feel guilty for not doing the exercises as specified by the book.  I must learn that I won't be punished for doing them out of order, Timothy Roderick (the author) isn't going to stand over me and demand that I do everything exactly as written.  I am only accountable to myself, and if it's necessary to take a few days to get re-settled, I will take them.  This journey isn't about doing things correctly, it's all about learning and being patient.

The real Day 2

On this day, we're asked to consider certain words, our comfort level and understanding of each, and how we think they will impact those not involved in Wicca.

Wicca

I haven't had much experience with this word or its concepts until I met Mary and Natalie at DePauw, and I learned a little bit about it by spending time with them.  I was raised in a Catholic family, but it wasn't so strict that I couldn't explore other religions.  While I knew there were other systems of belief in the world, I was still too nervous of what my parents would think to actually pursue any one seriously.  They were fine (sort of) with me not being Catholic, but how would they react to my studying Buddhism or even Wicca?  There are times when I realize that the limits to my parents' open-mindedness  are not as far as I thought.  I personally am comfortable with using the word and talking about it with other people, but I think that I would have to keep it from my parents' friends and my family, who are mostly Catholic.  I wonder that they might be uncomfortable at first, but if I explained it to them, their comfort would increase...

Witchcraft

This word has way too many negative connotations in my memory to be able to use it comfortably, after reading about the Salem witch trials and the treatment of witches and those thought to be witches during the Middle Ages.  I like to think that we've evolved past such narrow ways of thinking, but that's being too idealistic.  If I were to begin to seriously practice Wicca, I couldn't refer to myself as a witch, because of all the popular misconceptions and my own discomfort with the word.

Power

After starting massage therapy school last summer, I began to view power more as an energetic force rather than the physical.  As we got more in touch with ourselves, I could start to feel other people's energy, and now I regard those who have a very strong personal energy as being powerful.  It's all in what you project that makes you powerful or not.  The physical body is a fragile thing, easily damaged; it's the spirit that defines a person.  I could go on and on, repeating myself and being redundant....

Ritual

This word isn't all too discomforting, since it seems to be used so commonly.  There are rituals in every religion and people have their daily rituals, before they go to work or go to bed....

Magic

This word, to me, is most often used in reference to magicians performing tricks.  My experience with magic has been superficial, as has many people's experiences, so I don't know how I could use this word in explaining Wicca with others....

Occult

I honestly don't know much about the occult; I've heard it used many times, but I've never bothered to look up the true meaning, so I'm not sure how it relates to Wicca....

Pagan

I actually really like this word, it refers to a time period and a people that I feel really drawn to, a time before Christianity became the popular religion.  I feel this intense desire to live in closer connection with the earth, and hopefully this journey through Wicca will help it to become at least partially realized...

*as it gets later in the evening, my answers become shorter and shorter...

Spell

Casting spells has always been portrayed negatively, in my experience, in order to harm another person or for selfish gain.  I realize that spells can be positive and I hope that I can learn more about that aspect of Wicca.  Again, since it has rather negative connotations in popular society, I don't think I could this word comfortably with anyone outside this sphere of knowledge....

Earth-Religion

This phrase seems a bit hokey to me, like some stereotypical New Age-y phrase used by people pretending to be Wiccan or Pagan.  I hadn't heard of it until now, but I wouldn't necessarily use it to describe Wicca....

Well, that's it for me, I'm caught up (look at this, two days in and I'm already behind!)  I was wondering, in case you read this and have to comment, do you think that, instead of writing themes on a candle, burning it and then burying the wax, I could write the themes on bits of paper, burn them and scatter the ashes?  Honestly, I don't have the time to bury the wax, and like the idea of watching my old beliefs burn away and being able to really let them go.What do you think?