Gm! How’re you?
9 and 20?
Hello! I'm well, thank you, hope you're too! i'm sorry for the wait, took me a bit to be able to organize my thoughts and life got a little in the way of me writing them. But here they are:
9. What’s something you wish more people understood about the craft?
For the longest time, I wished more people would see how ancestral veneration (or at the very least, acknowledgement) is, in my opinion, essential to a well matured craft, and to a well matured person in general. In a way, my prayers were heard. Recently I've been seeing more people show interest in ancestral veneration and at least mention working with ancestors in their witching endeavours, but I think there's still an important aspect of ancestral work missing: unlearning and decolonizing. Acknowledging one's ancestry without actively working on healing any wounds it may come with (white guilt and how many run from their family's history and baggage, colonization, assimilation, all the internalized sexism, racism, etc, the list is endless) is honestly not only incomplete work but most times, actively harmful to others, as it perpetuates structures of genocide and cruelty.
We don't only inherit magic from our forebearers, we inherit our understanding and our ways, the good and the bad, and that makes a big part of the whole society we live in. It's our job to do our part to learn from Our Ancestors' errors and merits, better ourselves, and make the world better for those to come. That is as central to ancestral work and veneration, as a strong ancestral foundation is central to magic.
20. What’s something you’re currently interested in and/or learning about?
I've been working on deepening my understanding of our deep ancestors, to strengthen a relationship with them. I say our and not just my, because it's Ancestors who would've lived thousands of years ago and there's a good chance we share more than a few.
I've always worked with my ancestors very closely, but this is more like following the Ancestors of those Ancestors. Ancestors shared across the family tree and across societies, who've shaped much of what we know and do in the present in much of the modern world. I showed interest a while back, and after being consistent in my efforts and proving an honest heart, a certain someone answered back. I've been following their footsteps backwards, through the different eras and regions, letting the Ancestors' hands hold me and guide me on where I should make my next step like a blind man, while following the voice of an Entity or God I call The Father of Wilderness.
It's... interesting, to say the least. Not only because it puts our entire history as a species into perspective (which was the reason for my initial interest as an ecologist, how changes in our cultural and spiritual understandings over thousands of years have reflected in the respective changes in our behavior as a society, how we relate to other humans, but also in how we relate to nature and the ecosystem around us) but also because they have so much to teach about what truly makes us human. Regardless of all differences you can find between the lifestyle of someone in the modern day and someone who lived 20.000+ years ago, or even 200.000+ years ago, we're all human. It's the things that we can find in common across the ages, the things we can learn from Them about our own humanity, that fill my heart. Again, learning from Them across time and space, recognizing their errors and their merits.
I also have fun finding parallels between how the Father of Wilderness, Patron of this work, revealed himself to me, how he wishes to be honored, and with other people's deities or cults of similar figures. There's very specific details, differences, in our views and approaches, that are fascinating to see and keep my mind busy trying to untangle the why's of it all. I've been trying to put all my findings and thoughts into a written little something but it's long and it may take a while before I'm satisfied with it. If you're interested, eventually it'll see the light here as a blog post.
(You see a little bit of it hinted at here already, when I mentioned the value of an honest heart. It's not just words. In my experience, it's a must, a prerequisite to have the attention, guidance and favour of the Father of Wilderness.)
Thank you for asking! Getting all of that out of my brain and into somewhat not totally coherent words was a very good mental exercise.
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for clarity about what i consider my spiritual beliefs, i don't worship female goddesses or anything, but i do believe in the universe as an energetic reflection of our experiences on earth, reincarnation, spiritual guides, and that everything around us in natural and otherwise has energy and the universe speaks to us all the time through the material world. i give offerings to my spirit guides and ancestors all the time, call upon them, and pray to them. i take walks along the lakeside or in the forests to meditate. thats my realm of spirituality, which i can hope yall can see is not the same as any religion lmao.
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No one:
Me, running on a full coffee thermos and zero sleep after a long day, after playing Hollow Knight to get a break from collecting figurines so both me and Link/Four won't go insane before rolling up to ruin Vaati's entire day and existence:
The Hollow Knight from Hollow Knight🤝 Breath of The Wild Link/Lu Wild 🤝 Original Attempted Calamity Hero
Thought to be a kingdoms final hope but due to circumstances outside of their control ended up idnavertedly heralding it's doom by either failing to defeat the evil/only sealing the evil for a time until it would inevitably break free to rampage again and either aiding in dealing with it or being unable to do anything about it/sealing it with their fall from grace.
The Hollow Knight from Hollow Knight🤝 Breath of The Wild Link/Lu Wild 🤝 Age of Calamity Link/ Lu Calamity : No Mind to Think No Will to Break No Voice to Cry Suffering, though to be fully emotionless/stoic but oh, they feel a lot actually but they're forced to hide and suppress it due to the expectation set upon them by their respective kingdoms in being their only hope against a great evil and so they're expected to just be a machine that gets the darned job done, probably needs a big hug a blanket and warm soup.
The Radiance 🤝 The Pale King 🤝 Hylia 🤝 Demise : Higher Beings with Thematic Parallels, something something "Maybe in another life I could have had your life and you mine" idk.
(Edited)
Hylia 🤝 The Pale King 🤝 King Rhoam Bosphoramus Hyrule : Idnavertedly condemning the people they love or care for to arguably a fate worse than death in an attempt to do the right thing in an extremely dubious manner to protect their subjects, No Cost Too Great. In true Deity fashion showcasing how being loved by one is dangerous on the case of the first two idk maybe it's just the mythology obsession rearing it's head.
Anyway, have a lot of thoughts about them. Discuss I guess? *Leaves without elaborating to get more coffee*
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I'm watching two documentaries of one of my familys' villages and Palestinian and 'Israeli' witness accounts from the Naksa and a Jewish tour guide comes to one of the villages (which were the 3 villages side by side, all of them affected) and points to a bathhouse with gravestones all around it. The area of all three villages is now completely demolished and the Jewish National Fund built the "Canada Park" (funded predominately by Canada! Through tax deductible donations!), as well as an Israeli settlement, on top of it. An Israeli woman sits, eating from the trees that my ancestors planted, and she says "this is war. I dont feel the pain from these places, the pain of the people. This is what happens in war." Can you imagine? She sits, eating from my ancestors trees and she says "it doesn't matter to me." The level of selfishness to be so confident in your theft!
In the documentary, a Palestinian elder from Yalo says, holding back tears, that her dream is to go back to Yalo and die and be buried in her home, where her husband died. That was my great grandmothers' dream that was never realized, just a few years ago in a village not far from Yalo.
They talk about how this was a war crime, a crime against humanity. Since '67 we have been having these discussions. Since '48 we have been talking about war crimes committed by Israelis! These are the same discussions we keep having! The same facts we keep repeating! Even Yitzhak Rabin says the same things, that this is war, this is what happens in a war! It's the same things over and over and it's happening in Gaza!
There are people still alive who participated in the ethnic cleansing of these villages. They participated in demolishing these villages. They participated in killing those village members. They participated in the generations of poverty that Palestinians experience. They're still alive and just walking around in Israeli society, encouraging the genocide in Gaza. How can I trust a society like that? Knowing that these people are lauded as heroes for erasing these villages. How can I trust them when barely anyone in this society acknowledges the violence done onto us? Abhorrent violence that they let happen so willingly!
Here are the documentaries. These three villages were ethnically cleansed in '67, and it's shocking to hear the same sort of stories we hear from Gaza today. The same playbook, the same places.
Villages: Yalo, 'Imwas, Bayt Nuba
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