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Invited possession/horsing and channeling/divine inspiration.

  
  

Page: 1(2)34567... 9

 
 
EmberLeo
17:55 / 16.08.06
Vodoun has such tests, such as the Ghede drink: rum in which a number of scotch-bonnet peppers have been infused. Only Ghede can drink it. Someone faking possession or imagining themselves to be possessed would be unmasked in short order.

Yeah, but traditional Vodoun doesn't, as I understand it, acknowledge partial posession. That's the test for full posession.

Is there actually anyone on barbelith that does not and has never spoke in tongues?

As far as I know I've never done it - I wasn't raised that kind of Christian, and nobody who has ridden me has seen fit to use anything other than English. I have had to knock somebody else out of trance when he started speaking tongues, though.

Could anybody describe how they would deal with an unwanted entity lobbing itself into there head space?

In my own head when I'm by myself or whatever? Well, Invoking whatever cues I have for coming out of trance. So... Salt. Putting my hand on my head. Telling myself my own name, properly. Telling them "the hour grows late" and that it's time to go away. Taking off whatever clothing or jewelry I'm wearing that might encourage them, and putting on my own personal necklace, and perhaps my Lion t-shirt or something.

We use, on a casual basis, "Back in the box!", but that's not really meant seriously. Still, it does help after a while.

--Ember--
 
 
EmberLeo
18:43 / 16.08.06
I've been trying to process something that's apparently been leaking out the edges of my conversations here at Barbelith, such that I've at least referenced it in a few other threads. This is almost certainly the correct thread to try and relate what happened in a cohesive manner...

I practice posessory trance as part of a community that does so. There are all kinds of debates as to the ethics of it, but most of the folks who say it's unethical seem to base the argument on the concept of cultural purity, so I kinda ignore 'em.

As I understand the stages of posessory trance, they go something like: Inspiration, Automatic Writing, Shadowing, split dominance, posession, and full amnesiac posession. That's points on a spectrum with all kinds of in-betweens available.

I've never gone full amnesiac, but I've noticed a tendancy to either not remember or remember rather differently whatever profoundly important stuff that the god or spirit riding me happened to do or say.

I have some experience as a warder in handling people who are in posessory trance, including banishing unwanted guests (Baldr), or those who have outstayed their welcome (Pan).

I have been developing my abilities in this areas very intensively for the last several years. I've had a very strong sense of self and cohesion all my life (Really strong - to a fault.) so on the one hand I haven't tended to be afraid it was possible to lose myself, and on the other hand the process of learning to let go of that control has been what seems to me to be slow and difficult.

I wrote it up in the Oracular thread...

What happened last February was that I was in the chair for Seidh at PantheaCon, which is a pretty big festival, and we had a pretty large crowd. Lots of energy to work with. Full length ritual. I'd been working and ritualing for two days already. My dear friend and lover was standing chair for me, supporting me. My teacher was guiding. Everything was set up perfectly for me to get knocked so far into Otherspace and "ergi", subspace, receptive, passive, whatever-you-call-it mode that when Odin was asked for, He didn't have to check in with me at all before just posessing me outright.

And it wasn't okay with me. What was scary wasn't just that He could overcome any objections I might have had. What scared me was that I wasn't in a place where I was capable of offerring any objections!

The thing is, I had community support, full staff, protective rituals, etc. etc. Getting Odin back out of me was trivial. Hell, having Odin there wasn't that big a deal, because He was actually quite compassionate and pleasant on the inside. Sounds like it should have been an accomplishment, for goodness sakes - I managed a much deeper, more profound trance than ever before! Go me!

Instead I've come away violated, hurt, scared, and deeply angry.

People say "Well, the resources to keep Him from doing something bad were all there - if He'd done something horrible with your body, they'd have stopped it." And, well, He didn't do anything horrible with my body, unless you consider taking advantage of my lack of direct control horrible.

The entire problem, for me, was that moment where there should have been a checkpoint, and He walked right past it without my being able to stop Him. Once He crossed that line, the thing that broke was broken, and no amount of getting Him out would un-break it.

So... I don't know what to do with this.

If this is the right thread for this... Input?

--Ember--
 
 
Ticker
19:31 / 16.08.06


have to promote the D:MIT whenever I can.
 
 
Ticker
19:57 / 16.08.06
Instead I've come away violated, hurt, scared, and deeply angry.

People say "Well, the resources to keep Him from doing something bad were all there - if He'd done something horrible with your body, they'd have stopped it." And, well, He didn't do anything horrible with my body, unless you consider taking advantage of my lack of direct control horrible.

The entire problem, for me, was that moment where there should have been a checkpoint, and He walked right past it without my being able to stop Him. Once He crossed that line, the thing that broke was broken, and no amount of getting Him out would un-break it.

So... I don't know what to do with this.

If this is the right thread for this... Input?

I do believe this is the correct thread for input.

Somewhere, I don't know where, people picked up the idea of Gods as being bendable to human will. Sometime, and I don't know when, people started thinking this work was safe. It's not, it's terrifying and danger prone and any sense of safety is an illusion. Yet the same thing can be said about life in general. We function in a state of denial about car accidents, food poisoning, and heart attacks. It isn't really shocking that we have collectively forgotten the Other can be hazardous to our health.

Now that said, just like the dangers of the everyday world we exercise caution, best practices, and hope we are never in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Our Ancestors knew what the word 'awe' was really about. Gods maybe be friendly but They still are Gods (not even need to bring up the un-friendly ones...) and do all sorts of stuff without asking. They are like cats, everything is groovey when our purposes line up and there is hell to pay when it diverges.

Okay so now some useful information...

To be a servant of the Divine is to have faith, that faith in turn sustains you when really fucked up shit goes down, and that faith is nurished when wonderful things happen.

If your God pushes aside your sense of self, your ego, the very things you define your personhood by the only way to not be harmed by it is to know They have a reason. Hopefully your God loves you and isn't walking on you like a doormat. Checking this is why spirit workers need human community to help each person with the demands placed on them.

Gypsy Lantern made a point in the sexism thread about adjusting to the reality of this work. If anyone has told you that parts of your life will not be fair game to your Gods, I personally do not think you were told the truth. That's my opinion and yours may differ. I believe when we begin to work with Them everything we are is fair game to be adjusted, changed, taken, added to, ignored, and magnified.

Not everyone is a complete 24x7 servant to their Gods but some folks are. To believe that we can choose how much we wish to be affected by our relationship with Them is hubris as it would be in a human relationship of great impact. I can no more decide how hurt I will be by a mortal lover than my Divine Patron.

If you are called to this work it will be difficult and rewarding in turns but it is never safe.
 
 
EmberLeo
20:02 / 16.08.06
If your God pushes aside your sense of self, your ego, the very things you define your personhood by the only way to not be harmed by it is to know They have a reason. Hopefully your God loves you and isn't walking on you like a doormat.

Well part of the problem is that Odin isn't my god. He's my lover's god, my teacher's god, my gythia's god, but I'm not His.

I work for Freya and Freyr and the other Vanir, and for Ostara and... for some bizzare reason I'm still coming to terms with, for Ghede.

I can't say there's never problems, but unexpected posessory experiences with Them have never caused me the kind of anxiety this one round with Odin has caused, and quite frankly I don't really understand why or why not. I mean Freyr gets right past my checkpoints to the point where I don't even see Him passing through, much less get to stop Him. Doesn't bother me. I almost think it doesn't bother me because I can't deal with the implications if I take up being bothered by it.

So what gives?

--Ember--
 
 
Ticker
20:46 / 16.08.06
Once He crossed that line, the thing that broke was broken, and no amount of getting Him out would un-break it.


Your expectations of where that line was/is, was set how? Did someone tell you Gods only go so far, what would happen and so when it was different you felt your trust was betrayed?


Well part of the problem is that Odin isn't my god. He's my lover's god, my teacher's god, my gythia's god, but I'm not His.

If I came home and my dear friend was sleeping in my bed, my reaction would be much different than if my partner's dear friend was sleeping in the bed. Why? Because a lot of times we source our relationships strengths and levels of trust when suddenly thrust into an unexpected situation. You didn't have an established relationship with Odin and so of course it was a bit fucked up finding Him looking through your cupboards.


I mean Freyr gets right past my checkpoints to the point where I don't even see Him passing through, much less get to stop Him.I almost think it doesn't bother me because I can't deal with the implications if I take up being bothered by it.

Ah, is this about control for you?
 
 
Ticker
20:50 / 16.08.06
you mentioned sub-space in another post somewhere, I think it was the Seer thread.....

Are you comfortable with BDSM terms being used in this context?
 
 
EmberLeo
21:04 / 16.08.06
I'm comfortable with BDSM terms being used, but as I don't practice BDSM, I'm not guaranteed to understand them. I have lots and lots of friends who are in the scene, though, which is where I got the term subspace.

Hell yes it's a control thing for me. I wasn't per se told that that checkpoint would be there, so much as it always has been in the past, and the one case where it's not, I've never seen Freyr actively pass it, so much as realized He was already past it.

I compared my experience at the time to being drugged and handed over to somebody else's lover. That lover was truely gentle with me, but nevertheless had not established my consent, and I was not prepared for that experience.

I should clarify that I don't wonder how it happened. It's pretty obvious to me what agreements were in place, what rules were in place, what perameters set it all up, and where it went sideways. I recognise what Odin used as the loophole for consent, but I'm so not okay with Him being... I don't know how else to put it... Rules Lawyer?

I acknowledge that we almost certainly don't have direct control over what the gods can and can't do, I'm not so much upset that He can do it, as that He did do it. I guess I wonder why I'm supposed to accept that He hurt me, and that's just okay. I mean if a human did any such thing even if I did, indeed, incapacitate myself first, it'd be considered a crime, or at least something he should make ammends for, you know? People should be good and empathetic and such, but gods shouldn't? Just because we can't make them? Since when does Might make Right??

But beyond that, what I find scary, and am not sure where to go next with my trance work, is that while I'm sure He could have overcome my objections, what bothers me is that I couldn't make any. In BDSM, I think the equivalent would be finding myself so far out in subspace that I can't use the safeword.

Am I making more sense?

--Ember--
 
 
EmberLeo
21:07 / 16.08.06
Hell yes it's a control thing for me. I wasn't per se told that that checkpoint would be there, so much as it always has been in the past, and the one case where it's not, I've never seen Freyr actively pass it, so much as realized He was already past it.

I wanted to clarify here...

Part of what hurt was being able to actively percieve Odin very deliberately ignoring that checkpoint. I knew He knew it was there. He knew it was disabled. He actively and overtly took advantage of that.

This is not the same as Freyr's presence inside my boundaries. There was no point of passage, He's just there like He's part of me. Does the difference here make sense? I don't know if the difference is specific to Their relationships with me, or if it's just stylistic to Their personalities...

--Ember--
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
08:44 / 17.08.06
Is that not just the sort of thing that Odin would likely do though? I'm not seeing Him as the sort of guy who is going to really be too interested in your perceived boundaries if He has an agenda and wants to do something. Exploiting loopholes to get what he wants is not exactly out of character for the Old Man, is it? One way of looking at the incident might be to interpret it as Odin revealing as aspect of His mysteries to you. Perhaps there's something in there that He is trying to show you about boundaries and the ease with which He can move around them. Look at it as if it was a lesson, perhaps an uncomfortable one, but a lesson you are supposed to take something from.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
09:10 / 17.08.06
Is that not just the sort of thing that Odin would likely do though? I'm not seeing Him as the sort of guy who is going to really be too interested in your perceived boundaries if He has an agenda and wants to do something.

Yeah, I've been sort of nodding and rolling my eyes throughout Ember's description. I've never experienced a full Odin possession myself, but that does sound like the sort of thing He'd do based on what I have experienced and what I've heard from others. I've always found Him fair and reasonable, but I'm coming to understand that faith in Odin means 'faith that He's not going to fuck you up any more than He strictly needs to.' Just look at the sagas...
 
 
Doc Checkmate
12:59 / 17.08.06
I don't think you can expect your magic to treat you fairly. When I decided to start up with all this, it was with an understanding that it would not always be pretty, and that it might in fact be very unpleasant at times. I see it as a trade-off; magic is an act of opening yourself to the unknown, and unexpected ordeals find their way in along with the unexpected epiphanies, gifts of knowledge, etc. Magic doesn't necessarily respect the fact that you're really not up to dealing with the rough stuff today. I felt like I was tacitly accepting this just by wandering into the territory, which seems much more like a forest or back alley than a courtroom. No real rules, certainly no expectation of civility. In some ways, deity work is the strongest example. Isn't being upset at Odin for getting rough during an invited possession like getting mad at Legba for playing a trick?
 
 
Ticker
13:23 / 17.08.06
EL:

I acknowledge that we almost certainly don't have direct control over what the gods can and can't do, I'm not so much upset that He can do it, as that He did do it. I guess I wonder why I'm supposed to accept that He hurt me, and that's just okay. I mean if a human did any such thing even if I did, indeed, incapacitate myself first, it'd be considered a crime, or at least something he should make ammends for, you know? People should be good and empathetic and such, but gods shouldn't? Just because we can't make them? Since when does Might make Right??

But beyond that, what I find scary, and am not sure where to go next with my trance work, is that while I'm sure He could have overcome my objections, what bothers me is that I couldn't make any. In BDSM, I think the equivalent would be finding myself so far out in subspace that I can't use the safeword.

GL:

One way of looking at the incident might be to interpret it as Odin revealing as aspect of His mysteries to you. Perhaps there's something in there that He is trying to show you about boundaries and the ease with which He can move around them. Look at it as if it was a lesson, perhaps an uncomfortable one, but a lesson you are supposed to take something from.

MC:

faith in Odin means 'faith that He's not going to fuck you up any more than He strictly needs to.' Just look at the sagas...



EmberLeo in reading these three sections I'm coming to put my finger on what's bothering me about this event and your perceptions of it.

It keeps coming back to expectations for me. I feel as if you were not properly educated about what can happen and Who can show up and what They will get up to. Not that even the best teacher in the world can detail every possible interaction but I'm concerned that as Mordant and Gypsy point out, you really were caught off guard by Odin's manner when it appears He wasn't acting in a surprising way.

Shit I get surprised by my Gods all the time but I have a deep sense of trust in Them, even when They fuck me up.

This seems like a good segue to get into some BDSM language. I'm going to use it because the BDSM community is one of the few groups that has very thoughtfully explored power dynamics and how to discuss them effectively. I may be reviewing things you already know or I might not.

Human power dynamics within BDSM revolve around negotiation, self awareness, trust, and the excitement of flirting with danger or even straight out just being dangerous. There is always the edge, (it helps to think of it as a cliff edge), this is moment the action physically/emotionally goes to the limits of safety. This is where it can be really exciting and powerful and so many people want to get on tiptoe and look over it, but be brought safely back. Some people even want to be pushed over what they think is the edge so they can discover no it's really a few more inches out.

Negotiation between the person creating the action (Top) and the person undergoing the effects of the action (bottom) is held between equals. It is expected that each person is being as honest and as self aware as possible yet, everybody has a blurry understanding of their limits until they are face to face with them. A good Top knows a bottom will not be in the most rational mental state to calmly call out their status so they will check for physical signs and other indicators. The job of the Top is to get the bottom as close to the edge as they want to go and to bring them back safely, maybe if they really have an insight into the bottom the Top might push that edge a bit.
The negotiation usually includes a safeword or action which the bottom may use at any time to stop the action cold. The Top doesn't need a safeword or action, if they believe the action needs to stop, they stop it.

I think EmberLeo, you know all of this but to continue.....

Okay so a Top and a bottom are two equal people selecting the action, one's just driving while the other is along for the ride, but they have had equal input as to the destination.

On the other hand we have a Dominant and a submissive. They are similar to a Top/bottom except that a Domme doesn't need to ask the sub about the destination of the action. The negotiation around what kind of action is permissable should still take place and perhaps the sub still has a safeword/safe action but beyond that point the choice of where they are going is up to the Domme. The equality in the power dynamic has changed at this point and the Domme is now in control fully unless the sub uses the safeword(and some folks don't use one).

I think EmberLeo you were looking at possession work in the context of a Top/bottom where you would be consulted and were an equal.

Since when does Might make Right??

When the Top is also a Dominant and is doing as Gypsy brings up:

He is trying to show you about boundaries and the ease with which He can move around them. Look at it as if it was a lesson, perhaps an uncomfortable one, but a lesson you are supposed to take something from.

Mordant has sort of nailed Odin's nature here:
faith in Odin means 'faith that He's not going to fuck you up any more than He strictly needs to.'

Odin is not a Top, He is A Dom and as such if you are in His domain you are probably not going to be consulted. Nor did He do anything wrong in that context for which He needs to make amends to you.

If anything Ember, I'd like to see you maybe dig into some more information on the personalities and habits of Those you are working with or might have show up for tea. I do hope this is helpful as I do feel a great deal of compassion for you. It can be very scary and hard to work with these dynamics.
 
 
illmatic
13:52 / 17.08.06
I haven't got time (or the knowledge to be honest) to make a long post on this, but I found your account really interesting , EmberLeo. One idea that came to me as I was reading is that isn't this kind of scenario quite common in cultures where possession is part of the cultural background? Don't people have alarming, untoward and unexpected experiences? Isn't that in a sense, part of the territory? If you've been working closely with this stuff for a while, it doesn't surprise me that it reached out and grabbed you.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
13:53 / 17.08.06
I wonder if it might not be a healthy, healing experience to arrange a talk with the Old Man so you can ask Him to clarify why He did things that way. Have you asked your patron for guidance?

I find that most, if not all, of my painful and scary experiences come down to a lack of understanding between me and the being in question, usually because I was working from mistaken assumptions and hadn't asked the right questions before getting into a situation I then found hard to handle. Sometimes the response to my impassioned "I can't believe you DID that!" has been a genuinely bewildered "Well, what did you expect?" And you know, They've been quite right.
 
 
EmberLeo
18:07 / 17.08.06
Gah, ok. This stuff is upsetting to me. It's gotten a bit long and ranty...

Isn't being upset at Odin for getting rough during an invited possession like getting mad at Legba for playing a trick?

It's probably even dumber to be upset with Odin for being gentle in an uninvited posession, then, eh?

Yes, I should probably continue my research on anything and everything, but the problem here isn't that I don't have a fairly solid idea what Odin is like. I don't wonder why He did it. I don't think it's out of character. He behaved so totally in character and then some while He was riding me that I don't even wonder if it was really Odin.

The reason I don't choose to work with Odin is exactly this disregard.

I have spoken with Odin... oddly enough through a natural medium who had never met Him before at all, but He knocked so damned hard on her head when I tried to ask her advice that we decided it was best to let Him through. (After some discussion about His nature etc. including my pointing out that the nature of the problem was directly related to the way He drops in and how hard it is to get the old bastard to leave you ALONE after He's touched you at all.)

Everybody has told me it's about negotiation and boundaries. This makes me think I have utterly failed to describe what's wrong here. I had boundaries. I had the negotiation. Everybody seems to think that should have mattered. It didn't.

I tend to look at everything as a lesson, but it's not seeming to help here. The boundary crossed matters too much to me, apparently, for me to just happily go along learning my lessons.

I'm sure you are all right that I'm just refusing to see this the right way. I wouldn't argue with an earthquake. I don't bitch at the ocean when I wipe out bodyboarding. Why be mad at Odin for behaving according to His nature?

Which brings me around to the obvious and useless answer of "Because I fucking am because He conciously and deliberately hurt me and I don't think thats okay!"

Obviously I'm too modern, Western, post-feminist to be doing this work, because I don't think Feudalism and Slavery are acceptable paralells for working with the gods. I'm less powerful than the gods. That's not the same as being worth less.

Plenty of people have a nature that leads them to misbehave. Since when are the people they hurt told "Oh, that's their nature, so it isn't really wrong." instead of "Well, press charges." (Press Charges? I've come back to that a couple times. I wonder if I should talk to Tyr or Forseti, rather than the Vanir?)

GAH!

.... One of the things that keeps bothering me is the... The idea that no matter what I do, I'm bound by His rules, and His rules are set up so I have to follow them, but He can cheat, and He isn't even going to be per se ethical about it.
------------

It JUST occurred to me to wonder why, if He's so fucking powerful, He didn't flip a switch in my head to accept all this... I know They can do that kind of thing. If anything, it seems like He flipped a switch to make me extra unhappy about it all. Mmm, but He's not the only one with switch-flipping capacity...

*sigh* I don't know.

--Ember--
 
 
EmberLeo
18:19 / 17.08.06
DING!

I think, looking back, we've gone the wrong way in terms of what I need to grok. Yes, the ethics and whys and wherefores of the God's behavior matters to me, but ultimately I probably just need to come to terms with it.

What I'm not even wrapping my brain around is this:

what I find scary, and am not sure where to go next with my trance work, is that while I'm sure He could have overcome my objections, what bothers me is that I couldn't make any. In BDSM, I think the equivalent would be finding myself so far out in subspace that I can't use the safeword.

--Ember--
 
 
Ticker
18:23 / 17.08.06
Everybody has told me it's about negotiation and boundaries. This makes me think I have utterly failed to describe what's wrong here. I had boundaries. I had the negotiation. Everybody seems to think that should have mattered. It didn't.

Er, I am trying to gently tell you that some of Them don't really go in for that sort of thing. Sometimes you just belong to Them.

As for value, I value my cat very highly as much as a human (if not more). I'm still not going to have a discussion with his input about getting him neutered. I love him, I'm invested in his well-being and I'm full of sadness that the surgery sucked ass. I still had his wee generative organs altered. He has the same value as I do we just have different roles in the relationship.


It JUST occurred to me to wonder why, if He's so fucking powerful, He didn't flip a switch in my head to accept all this... I know They can do that kind of thing. If anything, it seems like He flipped a switch to make me extra unhappy about it all. Mmm, but He's not the only one with switch-flipping capacity...


Funny Raven has a passage in his new book that asks the same question about his God's adoption process. Raven finally figured out that the process of struggling with the new relationship in and of itself transformed him. Other people fall mushy head over heels in Luv, others fight the entire time. The reasons become crystal in hindsight. Maybe you should read the book? It sounds like it could help though it is a bit heavy on the BDSM aspects.
 
 
Ticker
18:33 / 17.08.06
what I find scary, and am not sure where to go next with my trance work, is that while I'm sure He could have overcome my objections, what bothers me is that I couldn't make any. In BDSM, I think the equivalent would be finding myself so far out in subspace that I can't use the safeword.


..and you don't trust the Person who got you there?

A lot of folks want to get to that space but the anchor, the silver cord that gives a sense of safety, is the relationship. Not what's happening, but again, Faith. You have to trust and have faith in yourself and the Other (doesn't matter if it is a human or a God or a pink elephant named Frank).

You need to come to terms with what having Faith means for you and Trust. Even if you are being lent out to other Gods, you should have Faith and Trust that your God(s) is watching and will keep you safe.

..or conversely if you are harmed it is because you need to be, hammer blows of the Sculpter again.

Not to sound dismissive at all but it's a learning curve thing. You're building relationships and things, including you, are changing regarding your perception of reality.

Has any one talked to you about how some Gods pick people of Their own? Not invited?
Or what it is to be called to full time priesthood?
 
 
EvskiG
18:51 / 17.08.06
EmberLeo:

As I've noted, entity work isn't my thing.

I also understand that practitioners of entity work sometimes see the entities they work with (especially when labeled as gods) as vast things which can greatly overpower their will. (As opposed to demons -- whatever those are -- which appear to be subject to the magician's will. At some point it might be worth discussing the distinction.)

But personally, I'd say fuck Odin.

If he doesn't play nice with you, then don't play with him, and if he shows up uninvited kick him out on his ass.

If you're unable to do that with your current mind-set, figure out if there's another way you can. And if there are consequences to taking that sort of approach with such a vast and mighty entity, face 'em with a smile.

Perhaps this is a stereotypically masculine, ceremonial magician point of view that completely misunderstands the nature and point of entity work. And perhaps this is why I'm so unsuccessful in entity work.

Ah well.
 
 
Doc Checkmate
19:25 / 17.08.06
I think this is so interesting, because xk and Ev are basically providing opposite perspectives on how to respond when a deity does something that doesn't sit right with you. This reminds me of an issue sometimes raised within Tibetan Buddhism (sorry to bring it into everything, it's what's going on with me right now): what to do when your guru, who is supposed to be an infallible representation of buddhahood itself, does something fucked up. Do you reevaluate your guru as not so perfect after all and frown upon the behavior, or trust that there must be some higher, redeeming purpose to the behavior? (wikipedia Chogyam Trungpa for a pretty shocking example)

Which path you choose--giving Odin the ol' fuck off vs. trying to make it work--is a personal thing. Both seem valid to me, depending on where you're at. Either way, though, I think it's only going to upset you more to dwell on the offense caused by Odin's hurtful actions, as they were performed in complete accord with his well-established nature and there's really very little to be done about that. It sounds like you've come to this conclusion yourself but are (understandably) having trouble internalizing it and moving on. Of course, I could be way off base here. It's all very tangled, and like Ev, I don't do a huge amount of deity work.
 
 
Ticker
20:00 / 17.08.06
If he doesn't play nice with you, then don't play with him, and if he shows up uninvited kick him out on his ass.

Perhaps this is a stereotypically masculine, ceremonial magician point of view that completely misunderstands the nature and point of entity work. And perhaps this is why I'm so unsuccessful in entity work.

::GRIN::

You sound like my Dad, he's an antgagnostic and a Fortean. He has a particularly, ah, interesting relationship with the Divine. He once got trapped (via being led astray) in a cow pasture for a few hours within clear sight of the exit. I know he was in clear sight because I climbed up on the wall to find him and then went in to lead him out. He'd 'accidently' stepped in every cow patty in the field as well. (He was raised in a rural area so getting lost in a field and stepping in that much shit was not normal even on a bad day).

As far as I can tell the attitude of 'my way or the highway' only gets you so far when They have lot's of time and very unpleasant senses of humor.

My Dad's getting on better with Them and leaves out offerings in a sort of neighborly expression of generousity. He still grumbles a lot and doesn't trust Them beyond what is in Their nature and is pretty sure They're Up To No Good*.


I suspect it is also about the difference in having relationships with these Folks and knowing that like any relationship there is always the need for growth and communication.

While I do believe you can end a relationship with the Divine it strikes me as painful and awful as severing a family bond. I've experienced the grief of some places as they mourn the loss of their people and it is horrible.




*except for when he just 'happens' to run into the only person with the key to the cairn he has traveled 12 hours to visit or just 'happens' to meet another authority on ABC's or somesuch event that has Fingerprints all over it. Then it's raisin bread and whiskey all around.
 
 
EmberLeo
05:24 / 18.08.06
xk:
Has any one talked to you about how some Gods pick people of Their own? Not invited?
Or what it is to be called to full time priesthood?

Heh, yes, I'm in clergy training in a fairly extensive and experienced community and have been recieving fairly intensive instruction from many angles for several years now. I have all kinds of information, but right now it's just words, you know? A lot of it can only be grokked via experience. I know that. So great, here's my experience. Sometimes they suck. I've been trying off and on to process this crap since February. I guess I make a little tiny bit of progress each time.

Actually, the last six months have sucked for a wide variety of reasons relative to my becoming clergy. I've had reasons on several fronts to doubt my calling. But things have been improving again lately, and a lot of things are finally falling into place to show me that not only were the bad things not my fault, but I didn't even really make the wrong assumptions before. The various things that have gone wrong are settling into exactly the pattern I foresaw and aimed for - they just got much messier on the way than I had been able to anticipate, and caused much more pain along the way than I knew how to handle.

Odin, of all folks, is one of the gods who told me point blank that I shouldn't beat myself up for not getting everything right on the first try, or knowing what to expect when I've never done something. That irritated me too, since He dropped in on the person I was talking to uninvited. *sigh* I really do think He's fucking with me along "informed consent" spectrum for a reason. It's just the only reason I can see so far is that I should suck it up and accept that the gods can do whatever they want, and I'm powerless. Accepting the idea that I'm powerless is... um... the kind of thing that makes me want to not exist anymore.

..and you don't trust the Person who got you there?

What if you were in a scene and deep in subspace, and the dom you trusted brought in another dom you hadn't agreed to? Or a bigger dom came in, and the dom you trusted was somehow not alpha enough to stop them? Meh. I have no idea how to properly parallel this to a BDSM scene, really...

It wouldn't have worked if I hadn't trusted my lover, my teacher, the rest of the Seidh team, etc. i.e. The humans involved. Maybe I'm just an idiot not to have considered the fact that it's all well and good to trust the humans and trust that they understood quite well that I don't work with Odin, generally, if their connections to the Old Man are wide open because they work with Him heavily, and then I open myself up to them, trusting the fallible humans, well... *shrugs*

Like I said, I don't wonder how most, if not all of it happened in terms of the setup - that's pretty obvious in retrospect.

Ev:
If he doesn't play nice with you, then don't play with him, and if he shows up uninvited kick him out on his ass.

It's not my mindset, per se, it's my community. For me to get away from Odin I'd have to dump my lover and drop out of most of my religious activities. There are things I can do (and am doing) to minimize my obligations and exposure to Him, at least while I suss all this out, but to avoid Him I'd have to give up almost everything I've worked for the last several years.

You can probably see why I find that unacceptable.

Doc:
It sounds like you've come to this conclusion yourself but are (understandably) having trouble internalizing it and moving on.

Mostly... *sigh*. I think I'm having trouble between what seems like the practical, realistic answer, that feels like giving up, giving in, and undermining myself, which I think is weak and wrong of me, and what seems like the right and good answer, but is impossible to enforce, and makes me feel like I'm naive and childish to ever have expected better of people who are supposed to be better than me.

Was that just pathetic of me to assume that with greater power comes an obligation to be more... er... good? Right? *sigh* I'm an idealist, I admit it. Tyr has already called me on it, to demonstrate (significantly more gently) why I'm not His. But knowing which is the high road has served me so well in the past, and all of the sudden I'm on the wrong end of the low road and I don't know where to go now.

I realized something just now (see, this conversation IS helping) - I've spent the last several years working intensively on learning how to gain concious control over letting go of self-control (sounds funny, doesn't it? But that's really what it is.). It's been a long, hard, but highly satisfying road. All of the sudden I'm drawn up short by this undue success - I finally hit the bullseye (if not dead-center) and the first thing that happens is that I get hurt. I don't get several rounds of practice getting it right, to sample out the odds. Well it makes me crawl back into my exessive self-control doesn't it? But isn't this what They wanted of me? So why suddenly counterproductive? Was I just thoroughly mistaken, running down the wrong path all this time?

I can't really believe that's the case, so there's got to be something else.

Tibetan Buddhism (sorry to bring it into everything, it's what's going on with me right now)

No, it's a great example, and it's far enough out of my context to make me think in a useful way. My automatic answer is that everyone is fallible, even the gods, so especially fellow humans are. Thus if a human makes a huge mistake that I didn't think they'd make, I just accept it, make adjustments to my perception of their judgement accordingly, and move on.

By that reasoning...
It doesn't seem likely... but it is possible that He honestly didn't realize there was a problem. I mean He wasn't rough with me aside from the checkpoint problem. He was clearly deeply compassionate towards humanity, and especially the querants in the room who were asking Him for help and advice. Sure, He noted that the checkpoint was disabled and walked right through, but does that really mean He knew He should have stopped? He acts now as though He always knew - it seems like if He didn't do it on purpose He'd have appologized for hurting me, eh? But... maybe He's too proud?

I've been avoiding talking to Frigga about this because I assumed She'd be on His side and no help at all. But if He really didn't know and won't admit it due to pride, She's who would know, and could help me understand if the best thing is for me to just ask Him to please appologize for hurting me...

--Ember--
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
08:44 / 18.08.06
Please don't take this the wrong way, Ember - I am commenting on your behaviour and response to circumstance, not your character - but from my swift reading of this thread so far, your response to what has happened here seems, to me, to be completely lacking in humility. And gratitude, for that matter.

I have, aside from my reading of MC's various adventures, absolutely zero knowledge of the system you are working within, so perhaps humility and abandonment of self and its egoic attachments are not particularly par for the course within your spiritual system. But that would make it rather unique among spiritual practices, I think, and I sincerely doubt that this is the case.

You seem, from what I have read, to feel that you are, or should be, 'in control'. You seem to assume that you can walk, however carefully and respectfully, up to Divine Powers, say "Give Me!", and then, if what you receive is not what you expected, or wanted, or hoped for, or believe you required, or can easily understand, that you somehow have a "Sale or Return" policy, a 30 day Selfhood-Back guarantee, a Communer Protection Service. "I didn't order this!! Where's my comfortable lesson!!"

As I said, I know little to nothing of your system, so perhaps I'm completely off base. But, my own experience of these things is that if you Ask, you really don't have any recourse to pout, stamp your feet or turn your back once you start being Given.

Hawvlan lachma d'sunqanan yaomana, as the beardy fellow in the dressing gown puts it.

Grant what we need each day in bread and insight: subsistence for the call of growing life. Give us the food we need to grow through each new day, through each illumination of life's needs. Let the measure of our need be earthiness: give all things simple, verdant,
passionate. Produce in us, for us, the possible:
each only-human step toward home lit up. Help us fulfill what lies within the circle of our lives: each day we ask
no more, no less. Animate the earth within us: we then
feel the Wisdom underneath supporting all. Generate through us the bread of life: we hold only what is asked to feed
the next mouth.

As somebody pointed out upthread, this boils down, more than anything, to an issue of trust and faith. You are inviting the Powers to show you their version of existence and reality, then balking at what you are shown and suspecting that they, too, are fallible 'just like humans'...

Mate, if I thought the Powers I was working with were fallible just like humans, I wouldn't go near them with a 30 foot Astral Barge Pole. Just saying.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
08:56 / 18.08.06
Sorry, just to be clear: I'm well aware that you did not, as far as you know, 'invite' this particular entity in. But its a bit like throwing a party in someone else's house for you and your mates, and then being miffed that they, the owner of the gaff, turn up unannounced and start drinking all the booze.
 
 
Ticker
12:33 / 18.08.06
EmberLeo, a really big light just went on above my head.
I might be crazy but I suspect...
....take a deep breath and walk with me here....

Yo, you're having a stroll down the Hero's Path at the moment and not the Priest's.

On this journey it isn't about gentle acceptance, loving guidence, it's about struggle and the constructive friction between the Will of the Gods and the Hero's self driven quest.
Behind the curtain we know the Hero really is a priest and sacred rep of the Gods anyway but the dynamics are a bit different. They show up in disguise to help and harm but always further the Hero's evolution.

All these conflicts you are feeling the challenges to your calling your confusion and struggle between self and Other pretty much can be lifted from any of the epics. They are carrot n'sticking you along the rough spots in the road but They know you need to be responsible for earning the treasure on your own.

What if you were in a scene and deep in subspace, and the dom you trusted brought in another dom you hadn't agreed to? Or a bigger dom came in, and the dom you trusted was somehow not alpha enough to stop them? Meh. I have no idea how to properly parallel this to a BDSM scene, really...


I'm pretty sure your God didn't wuss out on you just because Odin wanted a turn. They aren't meek about protecting Their folk. Did your Gods and human guides never mention that Others might show up or you might be lent out?

As a Domme if I brought in another Dominant into a scene without explicit conscent of my sub it would be about testing the sub's trust in me. I would be seeing if our relationship was evolved enough for them to know I was there watching over them. Or by placing them before the terror of the Unknown to see if they could become aware of how they didn't trust me or themselves. Again it is the difference between a bottom and a submissive.

A submissive must at some point be able to fly on wings of faith/trust/love alone and in that moment release all fear of the outcome, all clutching at security and enter the state of true sub space. The love and trust in your Dom is the current which sustains your flight over the edge. Then you do not tumble and fall, but soar.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
16:08 / 18.08.06
I'm pretty sure your God didn't wuss out on you just because Odin wanted a turn. They aren't meek about protecting Their folk.

This gells with my own (limited) experience. I don't imagine that my patron has my back in any sense since I'm an adult and expected to take care of myself, but I do get the strong impression that if you have the patronage of a specific God then other Powers have to negotiate a bit if they want a lend of you.
 
 
Ticker
16:38 / 18.08.06
.. and to add to what Mordant said I don't think your Patron just sort of wanders off to raid the fridge while it's happening.
 
 
*
17:06 / 18.08.06
I've never horsed. I don't know if I ever will— it's never been asked of me that I know of and I have no reason to believe that it will in the future.

That said, I'm a little uncomfortable with how Ember is being treated here. One feature of many polytheistic religions in my experience is that no one God is seen as all-wise and always right— they sometimes make mistakes or do fucked-up shit. This is not to be disrespectful, because clearly Gods are much bigger than we are, and they also have much more knowledge than we have. We are small humans— but in my version of faith, that does not always mean we must bend to Their will. If Gods are capable of being wrong, but we are not always capable of knowing when they are wrong, then how do we navigate that?

Asking a God that you do trust for a second opinion could be helpful, but I don't understand Divine politics— could some Gods be swayed by fear of another? The stories seem to say yes. Could some Gods be motivated by envy or spite? Probably— I wouldn't ask Loki to tell me if Thor was acting badly.
Then there's personal sense of justice. One's sense of being hard-done-by is pretty easy to hear— I often feel I know when someone is treating me like shit. But sometimes my boundaries are inappropriate. I share a bathroom with lots of other people, and I feel terribly infringed upon when I go to shower and someone has left their bottles of shampoo, body wash, and who knows what other products lying all around the stall. But my feeling of injustice here is all out of proportion to the actual measure of harm I've suffered. When dealing with issues of spiritual ethics and magical morality, boundaries of appropriate vs. inappropriate can be even fuzzier. Some might say that no human ever has the power to give consent to a God, because of the power differential inherent in Divine/human interactions, so ALL horsing is nonconsensual, even if the mortal involved thinks they invited it.
In the absence of a Divine code of conduct somewhere or an absolute authority above Odin that we could appeal to for a decision, it seems to me that we can't make a real decision as to whether Odin objectively behaved wrongly here. There's simply no such thing. There's Ember saying that he transgressed her boundaries, and there's Odin and his supporters saying, essentially, "But he's Odin; what boundaries?" The only way we have to determine whether and how this was wrong is by its effects. Some of these may be invisible to all of us mortals, but the effects on you, Ember, are most clearly visible to you and your Gods. If you, from a space of clarity and reflection, decide that for you this was harmful, then maybe that is the lesson. Maybe it was arrogant to think that you could dictate terms to Odin, or that he would necessarily honor the boundaries of your comfort. Maybe the lesson is if those are your boundaries, you should not horse; or it may be that you are going to be called upon to horse and so you need to find a place of greater comfort with what's really going to happen. Regardless, your anger and your sense of injustice may not be perfectly reliable guides, but they're all you've got, and they just are— there's no right or wrong about them.

I hope this made some sense.
 
 
Ticker
18:17 / 18.08.06
hey id,

could you be more clear and what in the thread is making you uncomfortable about how EmberLeo is being addressed? Do you feel that she is being told she is doing something wrong? Can you please quote posts so I can see what you are seeing?


My statements are informed by my overall cosmology naturally, but I hope my presentation isn't showing up as right/wrong line calling?
 
 
EvskiG
18:21 / 18.08.06
Good points, id.

I'm troubled by how much of this discussion takes Odin, his existence, and his omnipotence and goodwill for granted.

Again, I (rightly or wrongly) see interaction with gods as interaction with normally unconscious parts of the self which may be wiser -- perhaps even substantially wiser -- than the conscious mind, but are by no means omniscient or guaranteed to be benevolent. Even if you believe in gods as objective beings, as id points out, there's no clear reason I see for assuming they're omniscient or guaranteed to have your best interest at heart.

With that said, EmberLeo's experience seems to be as follows: while in a ritual space she had an experience she found very unpleasant, in which she felt that her (mental, psychic, emotional) boundaries were violated by an entity she identifies as Odin. She's trying to come to terms with that unpleasant experience and figure out how to act going forward.

Some people seem to be saying that she should yield or trust in the ultimate benevolence of that entity. I said that if she felt upset or violated she should do what she can to keep it from happening again, unless it's on her own terms. In other words, acknowledge that you're NOT powerless -- that you're a wise, strong, beautiful, and powerful priestess, and that, god or no, you're not taking shit from anyone. I assume this can be done without threatening your place in your community.

I'm not big on submission, especially when it makes you feel upset or powerless.

Non serviam.

Others, of course, may have a different view.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
20:50 / 18.08.06
Some people seem to be saying that she should yield or trust in the ultimate benevolence of that entity.

Are people really arguing that? I think it's more a case of people who engage in this type of work and have some knowledge of Odin (leaving aside questions of hard or soft polytheism for the time being) having a particular take on what went down.

Don't get me wrong: whilst I love, revere and worship the Old Man and I am totally on the Odin cheer squad, I know what a complete bastard He can seem at times. He's kind of the ultimate relativist--while He does care about His people's wellbeing and can be very loving, whatever is going on with you is always going to be weighed against this huge big picture agenda He has going on.

But just because it's clear that Odin was acting in accordance with His nature that doesn't lessen or minimise Ember's evident suffering. I honestly don't think anyone is telling her "well, that's just how He is and you should just put up with it, dear!"

I said that if she felt upset or violated she should do what she can to keep it from happening again, unless it's on her own terms.

And I don't really think anyone else is saying anything different. Odin was able to jump into her head on this occasion because she was in a very specific state of consciousness. If I was Ember, I would certainly avoid putting myself under those circumstances again until I had gained sufficient understanding to resolve the situation.

The feelings that Ember is describing here actually resonate pretty strongly with me. The melted wax episode I described upthread initially fucked me up nintey ways from Sunday. When I realised what had happened while I was out I was utterly horrified. Even though I was unharmed, the fact that I had been called upon to do this potentially painful and even dangerous thing, and the fact that I couldn't even remember if I'd consented or not, really upset me. I had to get rid of some of the clothes I'd worn for the ritual because I couldn't stand having them anywhere near me (well, that and I didn't know how to get the candle-grease out). But I'm fine with the whole episode now because I was helped to understand that there were reasons for things being done the way they were, and also by the manifestation of very real benefits down the line.
 
 
Unconditional Love
21:20 / 18.08.06
The immediate thoughts that come into my head, in that particular cosmology, are Fenrir. Having said that i feel like a prick for even bringing it up, but i think it depends on how your seeing this interaction, in the context of a spirit relationship or an archetype/information way. I am guessing that even mentioning this to your community would get you some flak so please dont, and if your working in a spirit way please dont mess with fenrir, its just me looking at an extreme option, like a prick.

My rational is that cosmologys contain story structures that the spirits in a way have to conform to for there interactions (so vidar would probably show up next), also they contain precepts much like alchemy in some respects that combine to create new situations, so fenrir has to swallow odin, odin knows this and accepts it, because of what is to follow from the battle that has to take place, the world that arises is one that creates harmony for all, yet the battle has to take place.

The battle to me, and this is my own translation, reads like a dark night of the soul, various aspects of the self confronting there shadows, everything plunged into darkness, but from that darkness a new world is born, just as when our own limitations or barriers are challenged and we fight to keep what is old and familiar, because it seems to us like the real us, but through the struggle, the submission, the fighting, the crying, the killing, the dying we can learn to live again in a new way, it may not be perfect harmony, but i have a feeling that at least for me id be bored shitless with perfect harmony.

You could rationalise odin as the struggling fighting principle of life and fenrir as an all consuming death, a little simplistic perhaps, but stay with me just for a little bit more, vidar could be seen as the one who gives birth to himself and the new world/view in the moment he rips apart fenrirs jaws and fenrir himself, but his father the old way of life must be swallowed and killed so vidar can persist.

I have in all probabilty mutilated norse mythology, apologies mordant and anybody else, and i am not sure i can even remember why i started this, but anyway here it is.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
21:31 / 18.08.06
Well I don't think you should be all apologetic, we don't have copyright on the Gods just because we worship them. Other people have every right to come along and offer their own interpretations of the legends from a non-theistic perspective. But... what on Earth does all that have to do with this thread?
 
 
Unconditional Love
21:38 / 18.08.06
This was going to be my point before that came out, all these entities have precepts to follow written in there cosmologies which is the advantage of working in a tradition. They can bend them alittle but they are caught in a sense in there own stories, much like we are in the stories we tell ourselves. Even the tricksters are trapped and tricked in a sense to being tricksters.

With that in mind it becomes easier to guide spirit experiences if you have a thorough knowledge of the cosmology you are working within(thats my half hearted attempts at spiritual immersion stuffed), everything generally has its counterpoint, but that is also a process in and of itself. There are ways to introduce these mythological precedents into your workings, the mythic structures act as a safe frame work for conducting possession experiences within.

Dealing with entities outside of there own stories and relationships leaves you interacting in a void, the entity responds to you and is not constrained by the framing of the communication, except your own reactions.
 
  

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