building happiness

I have Major Depressive Disorder.
Some of you already knew that. It's not a secret.

When my medication works: It's as though that gray cloud that's hanging over me, is just hanging there. It does not shrink or lift, but it does not rain, either. The medication removes the immediacy, the weight, of Depression, but does nothing to fill that void with happiness, or with anything at all. The happiness I must work for.

That work involves building my home into a sanctuary, a place a feel a strong, healing connection with. I am an animist, and I feel strongly the flows of energy around me. All things have a spirit, an energy; this is the basis for my connection with my home, once it is built. This is also the way I heal best. Without my sanctuary - without a place I can go that is a safehaven, a shelter from all the hurt out there in the world - I am ungrounded. Being ungrounded unnerves me, and makes me unhappy. I learned this very recently.

When I moved into a new house at the end of August, I knew it would be tough. I did not know the move would send me into one of the most difficult depressive episodes I have experienced in recent memory. I figured out fairly soon (mid-move) that the episode was connected to the move. I thought it was just the change. The stress. The challenges. A normal reaction to a difficult time for anyone, but especially for someone with MDD (or other mental illnesses, I'm sure).

Perhaps a week ago, I had a particularly bad night. In the worst depths, I began writing down my thoughts. Understand that my thoughts when I'm in the grip of Depression are not reliable in the details, but they often reveal the underlying trigger(s) for that particular event. In this case, the thought that came out was clear: I miss my home, I wrote. I miss the safety, the sanctuary of my little house.

Just a few mornings ago, a conversation with Archer - my soulfriend - clarified my feelings for us both. I needed to feel the connection I'd had with my old house; I needed to build that connection with my new house. Without it, I feel like a stranger usurping the space within this building, intruding in the house's domain. So I will build a relationship with my new house.

This is the work of happiness.

It includes a list of things to do: hanging the rest of the pictures and art, organizing the bathroom drawers, sweep up the already-accumulating dog hair, et cetera.

It includes organizing my container garden in its new home.
A gift came from an unexpected new friend, just after our unexpected move. It was a wormwood plant, an herb sacred to Hel. It's thriving in the sunlit porch of this house. 

It also includes a ritual of bonding, in which I will introduce myself to the house-spirit, and entrust it with the protection of my self and my family. Together, the house-spirit and I will ward this space, while I weave my roots to its anchored beams. I will ground myself in this home, and create a sanctuary of it. Then, I will welcome my gods to join this bond: Sretya, who holds the luck of homes; Hel, who keeps truth and order in life and death; Bast, who brings joy to those who wait; and Odin, who guides the steps of wisdom-seekers. My altar will be built, and my guardians will be placed.

I will come home.

equinox reflections on Hel, and death as duality

"If there is spirituality in nature, it is in the sublime purity of wild roses and wild mushrooms in mossy woods and the vitality of deer nibbling kelp on the beach and the violet light of an oncoming storm and, equally, in the anarchy and filth of the spawning grounds, in the undoctored real of the ever-dying world...

Nature is not simply done to. Nature responds. Nature talks back. Nature is willful. We have no dominion over the wild darkness that surrounds us. It is everywhere, under our feet, in the air we breathe, but we know nothing of it. We know more about the universe and the mind of an octopus than we do about death’s true nature. Only that it is terrible and inescapable, and it is wild."

Read more: http://www.utne.com/mind-and-body/facing-death-zm0z14fzsau.aspx#ixzz3E4HtAHLc



Some things, we know.
Some things, we know as pagans.
Some things, we know as pagans who follow Hel.

The two sentiments quoted above are both from the same article. The author is facing the world knowing she has very little time left in life. Soon she will cross over to wild death's hands.

Roxy, my ancient boxer, is approaching that same door, though I'm not sure she knows it. I'm not sure she doesn't know it, either. Maybe, like the salmon in the article, she seeks it instinctively and defiantly. Mostly, she seems very tired.

Equinoxes are balancing times; the Autumnal Equinox turns our faces toward death. The natural world becomes darker and more deadly, and living things prepare for the cold wait til spring. This is the turning point in the year's balance. Life and death hold equal sway, today.

Hel is spoken of, almost entirely, as a 'goddess of death'. We discuss how death and life are entwined and interdependent, and we comment on Hel's appearance as being half alive and half dead, all in various terminology. Then, we name her Death. This is not inappropriate, as long as we recall that death is life, and life is death. When she collects our souls in her realm, she does so at the time our wyrd dictates, never early, never late. Her timeliness - her balance - marks her as a preserver of life, until that moment when death holds more sway than life. At that moment, she preserves death. Always, she is both. Ultimately, she is a perpetual equinox, inescapably balanced. 

coming home to Hel

During the lunar eclipse last spring, I dedicated my home to the service of Hel. Then I decided to move. The two events were not causally related. 

In the weeks before moving, dead things began appearing on my doorstep. I mean that literally, and no, I do not have a cat. A hummingbird, perfectly preserved in flight-like posture, was laid in the center of my back step one morning. A bumblebee curled hollow on my windowsill, outside after a rainy night. Et cetera. 

I thought it an odd coincidence.

I - we, the denizens of my new home - have not yet done any sort of ritual blessings or dedications for this new house. 

Lately it seems that "death's door is flung wide open" - a quote I'm stealing from a friend of mine. And probably these many deaths - in my presence, in my community; our small town has lost so many over the past few months - are nothing to do with my springtime dedication to Hel. 

Regardless. 

I feel myself called back to Hel. 

Not that I had ever left, but I have been focused on other things beside my spirituality - moving, for instance. The pull of my spiritual path has been strengthened by a tie recently cut, that held me - somewhat - away from pursuing my faith in the manner I would chose for myself. That is, I've cut ties with the coven I was a member of. 

Technically speaking, they cut the ties. They sent me an email, addressed to the entire coven, that detailed a list of complaints about my lack of attendance. I hadn't made it to all the meetings during my move. ...Before I allow this to devolve into sarcasm, I'll just say that it's for the best. The coven's spiritual path had never truly been my path. 

Mostly because I'm not Wiccan, and they were (they don't call themselves that, but they use all Wiccan books and rituals and believe that all gods are essentially the Consort and all goddesses are essentially the Lady. As a result, they don't bother getting to know the gods they call on, beyond a cursory internet search for relevant myths. So, yeah. Duo-theism. Is that a word?). Anyway, I'm a polytheist. My gods are separate entities. I anthropomorphize them like crazy, because it makes it easier to think about them, but really - if I really get down to it - I think of each as a separate energy with its own traits. So anyway, tangents aside, my reverence of Hel, or any other of the individual gods I work with, doesn't mesh well with their 'all goddesses are one goddess, who is the source of life' thing. 

So anyway.

I'm not in a coven anymore. 

This gives me more time to pursue my personal spiritual path. And ironically, will leave me more time to mentor my mentee from the coven. But that's another post. Is 'mentee' a word? I'm out of writing practice... 

And now I've circled back around to Hel. 

I'm not quite prepared to establish an altar in the new house, mostly because I don't know where to put it. So my house does not yet have a sacred space. My old house had become a sacred space in its entirety; I'm still searching out even one altar surface in this house. 

Patience. 

The house is still coming together as a living space. I have to be patient.  

For the moment, it's enough to know where I'm heading: home to Hel. 

symbols

Someone asked me an unexpectedly great question the other day: 'what symbols are you drawn to (in your spiritual path)?' It's unexpectedly great because it seems like an easy, superficial sort of question until you think about it. Then you realize it's not so simple, or so superficial. Or at least I did. Anyway, here's my response.

~

So, ten years ago... holy shit, no, more like 20 years ago - good gods I'm getting old... when I first started on the pagan path, I would have said (immediately and without a lot of thought, cuz that's how I rolled then) that I *totally* was drawn to the pentacle and pentagram. Mostly because I started out as a Wiccan, and they - especially the pentacle - were what I knew of as the "Symbols Of Wicca," much as the cross is a Symbol Of Christianity. I thought about is that way - caps and all - because I thought such things were Really Important.

In hindsight - and this is totally a tangent, btw - I think that sort of thinking was/is part of the cognitive legacy of having been a Christian for the first 12 years of my life. The put Caps on a lot of their Ideas. Know what I mean? Anyway, the more I broke with the underpinnings of Christian theology, the farther I got from that sort of thinking. 

Hmmm... the following will make a lot more sense if you know this about me: I'm on a shamanic/Heathen path. I am not Wiccan.

These days, I pick symbols that have personal meaning... which is probably about as clear as mud. So, let me give you an example: Ravens are strongly symbolic to me, and I'm very close to them in the sense that they are a totem animal for me. (There's a kinda long-ish story behind that, which I'd be happy to tell you, but it's totally another tangent so for now I'll just move on.) As a totemic animal, I see them as symbols but not *just* symbols; I have to incorporate all the *real* things about them, too, in order to work with them effectively.

When I work with my gods (I'm a polytheist), I use symbols that are meaningful to them. My 'patron goddess' - if you will - is Hel (aka Hela), so skulls/bones/dead things, but also signs of new life and transition like the remains of bird eggs and nests, or the shed skin of a snake, are all symbols of her. Working with Odin, I use runes, Ravens, Horses, or maybe even a bit of Jack Kerouac's writing... all depends on how I'm approaching him. So the symbols I am drawn to in my work with the gods are dependent on which god I'm working with, and what's important to both me and that god.

I did not die.

Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glimpse on the snow.
I am the sunlight on refined grain
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awake in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quick birds in circled flight
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry
I am not there, I did not die.

- Mary Elizabeth Frye, 1932

Hel has held my hand, and led me back again. I'm more alive than ever; I hadn't known how dead I was. Half-rotted, half-dead; that part's gone now. Stepping back, now, into a life I've never led. It's a little disorienting.

Today I painted. It felt so good, I didn't want to stop. I wanted to get really into it, but I was wearing my nice clothes - meaning, the ones that don't yet have paint on them (well, now they do, but they didn't when I started, dammit). I put the paintings on the wall of the gallery next to my older paintings. They looked disoriented, too.

I smiled on my way home from the gallery. I smiled all the way.

a conversation with myself

"The mysterious call of the Goddess doesn't come from the mental-thought realm. It comes from the body, pouring forth from your bones and your blood. Your cellular memory nudges you to remember there is more to life than what you experience in the outer world. The inner world is the domain of the Divine Feminine. She nutures and encourages you to explore your inner sanctuary."
- from Properous Priestess Handbook by Lisa Michaels

"Do I even have an inner sanctuary?" I pondered this; momentarily bitter and reflecting on the ravaged landscape of my inner self. The answer came from within: Yes. "But I don't know where it is." - Sadly, feeling knowing and confused. Yes I do - it's underneath, it's the core within the core, the life within the rot. It's what stays my hand when all feels worthless.

"If my inner world is the domain of the Goddess, then mine must be a real bitch. It's a war zone in here, and I'm not winning. Not much of a sanctuary."

But the battlefield isn't in the place of a sanctuary. The battlefield stands between me and my inner sanctuary. If I'm war-torn, then maybe it's because I've spent my life fighting the concept of housing anything Feminine in my body.

-Full stop-
-Epiphany-

Oh... wow. Yeah, could be. Could be.
Hela help me.

this night

Tonight is the first night of the waning full moon;
tonight is the second night of the waning year.

Tonight the cycle turns toward endings;
Tonight, as the endings begin, I ask that my cycle of pain end too.

Hela, please, help me shed these corrosive fears, help me silence the disparaging voice. 
Hela, please, help me release the parts of my body that do not serve me.

Hela, please, let these things end.

Burn away the sickness; I prefer the pain of the burn to the pain of lingering ailments.

May my upcoming surgery go well and be successful; may that which needs changed, change.

By Hela's Hand, so mote it be.

Who Bones is...

... a girl, usually. Like when it's convenient, which is most of the time. That means I often present as a woman. But my core is ambiguous, or maybe androgynous. If I need a label, the best one is genderqueer. Let's go with that.

... fragile, but not weak. I'm a survivor, despite being overly sensitive to the moods of my loved ones and fluctuations in my environment.

~

I'm also Eala Magee.

~

The nickname, Bones, actually came from something completely... what's the word?... irrelevant to anything meaningful. Inconsequential. A few years later, Archer and Hela gave the name meaning for me.

How I first acquired the nickname: The Army, you may be aware, is overly fond of alpha-numeric labeling systems. While I was overseas, I headed a two-person team that was labeled "B1". B-one. Get it? Yeah.
That year, needed a screen name for a website (OKcupid, if you must know), I used "humanbones" on a whim. Because I was a human intelligence collector called Bones.

Ok, so that was in 2007.
In 2011, I started dating Archer. Not so terribly long into our relationship, we were bickering about something via text (highly NOT recommended as a strategy for constructive argument, by the way), and I asked him (I hope I'm remembering this correctly) why he cared about whatever it was. He responded "because I love you down to my bones."
It was the first "I love you" of our relationship.

He had already taken to calling me Bones because of my screen name on OKcupid (we met via that website). After his "down to my bones" statement, it became a thing. I started using "Bones" elsewhere, just because it made me think of him and smile.

Later, well... I already wrote a whole post about Hela's influence on me. No sense in re-inventing the wheel. Or re-writing the blog. Whichever.  And the connection with my nickname... well, I had to get stripped down to my bones, psychologically, in order to 'fix' myself. More on why that's connected with Hela, here.


These days, I'm ... well, I'm tempted to say I'm a different person, but that doesn't quite ring true. I'm sure it seems that way from the outside, but on the inside I'm the same person I've always been. Only, without the false front I used to have. Without all the fear. Now, the inside matches the outside.

~

So, what does that outside look like? A painter, a writer, student, an aspiring psychologist and anthropologist, a pagan working with Hela, Odin, Sretya, Epona, and - unexpectedly - Bast. I talk to my dogs and my cat, who make me happy; they respond one way or another, for better or worse. I have only been without horses twice in my life - this is one of those times, and it makes me sad. I'm without a motorcycle, too, which also makes me sad. But I'm also a lover: anam cara to Archer, and girlfriend to Doc, and those things make me happy. Music makes me happy too.

These things have always been there, at least in potential; now others can see them too.

I don't know this guy.

I just found this video on youtube.

He's not a great dancer,

but he's better than many

and he looks like he's having fun.

I had fun watching him.

Maybe you will too.

[This moment of reflection has been brought to you by my upcoming first blogoversary, which will be 18 January. Blog party? Maybe. Let me get through finals first.]

self-renewal and repurposing my home

I've been quiet of late, I know.
I'm reordering my life. I'm focusing more on my relationships - with my child, with myself, with my gods, and with my loves - and I'm reorganizing my house, so that it will be more of a sanctuary - for my child, myself, my gods, and my loves. That's what I've always sought in a home; that's what I will create, here, for the first time in my life. A sanctuary, gestalt.

~

Odin seems to have taken up permanent residence on my altar. I think I need to make him an altar of his own, so I can retain the general-usefulness of the one current altar in my house. I'm not sure, yet, where I'll put it. Probably in my bedroom somewhere. But I need my altar for other work.

~

Yesterday I spent a large-ish chunk of time contemplating ways to make my home stronger, less malleable to the expectations of others. Hmm, I suppose that requires some explanation.

Here's the thing: I wouldn't have thought of this if it hadn't happened. I'm still not totally sure it isn't coincidental, but the more I think about it, the more my doubt fades. It just doesn't make sense any other way.

Every night, my dogs sleep soundly from the time I go to sleep (or earlier), until I wake up in the morning, and I wake them up by opening my bedroom door. Frequently, me opening my door only wakes up Bella, the younger of the two dogs. I have to intentionally rouse Roxy, my old lady dog, to get her up for her morning potty break. And every day, my child sleeps until at least 8am, if not 9am. I am always the first one awake in my house. On the rare occasions that I oversleep, the dogs stay quiet, waiting for me and snoozing, while Child plays quietly in their room. If I oversleep, it's because (I'm exhausted, and) the house is quiet enough that I can. In the mornings, as I get close to waking, I sleep very lightly indeed.

Every time that Archer spends the night, something happens to disturb our sleep. The dogs have a coughing fit (I'm lookin at you, Bella, with the one ticklish hair caught in your throat), or they've eaten something that disagreed with them (oh Roxy the Ravenous) and are loudly vomiting all over my carpet (really, you couldn't at least aim for the tile?). Or Child wakes up at the crack of dawn, and knocks on my door because "it's morning, Mama!" W.T.F. household. Why you gotta be like that? And why do you only do this shit when Archer is... here? Oh....

There has to be a reason. Archer and I have been together almost two years - the longevity of this issue makes me really think it's not a coincidence, any more. Maybe it was at first, but not after so long. It has become... habitual. And why is that? It could be that Child and my dogs feel a change in the household when Archer is here. It could be. But... that doesn't feel like it's a strong enough variable to be independent. Their energy is unfocused, reactive but not driven. Archer's energy, on the other hand, is Driven. He is powerful, whether he means to be or not. His expectations have a way of coming true.

So I think that my house needs to be given a purpose. It needs direction of its own, and the energy to resist the expectations of anybody who isn't Me. It's My house, dammit. As I contemplated how to do this, Sretya seemed to come back out of the mists. Of course - homes are her thing. In hindsight, that's probably why she didn't want to be involved in my recent spellwork that opened the door for Odin coming into my life. It was to help something that was outside my home, and outside my household. Duh.

Anyway, that's why I need the only altar I have, back. Odin is here, so with his and Sretya's approval, I'll include him in the ritual, In fact, with the approval of all three, I'll include Hela, Odin, and Sretya, each for their own reasons. But, Sretya is the power behind this upcoming work. Hela and Odin are there for me, in their ways, but Sretya is there for the home. The altar will need to reflect that. And Odin needs his own. Maybe Hela does too - I'll ask.

Once I complete this work, I'll get back to working on learning the tarot and the 78 days project, and re-learning the runes.

I'll keep you posted.

Samhain is acomin'

...as it edges nearer, and the desert autumn comes fully into season...

I think it's time to include my Child in a rite. This is the sort of thing Child can understand. Honoring those who have passed beyond this life and into another makes sense to Child. Now I just need to come up with an inclusive ritual.

We will honor my paternal grandparents and my sister, none of whom my Child remembers, but we will also honor some who are known to Child, like our cats Naanaa and Alison, and our dog Chaunzy.

We will pay respect to Hela in our ritual.

This might be a good time to foster a stronger relationship with our home and the spirits that live here, or even our totem animals.

It will have to be very active, to keep Child's attention.

That's what I know at this stage of planning, which is preliminary at best.

~

I've decided to take some tips from Circle Round, by Starhawk, Diane Baker, and Anne Hill. There are quite a few suggestions for activities, so I'm thinking of making a week of it, maybe doing one or two things each day for the five days or so before, then culminating with a Feast of the Dead ritual (of my own devising) on Samhain.

j is for... just breathe

Just breathe.

Letter to myself, this morning:

Just get through today. You don't have to be happy and outgoing all day, just for a few minutes. You don't have to be all business-casual all day, just for the interview. After that, you don't have to tell anyone anything, if you don't want to. You can stay home. You can paint. You can relax. You can read. You can wear your comfy jeans with the holes in them. Just breathe.

~

Yes, I have my comfy jeans on now.

I had an interview today. It was step 2 in my application for a scholarship. I feel like it went well, by the way. They seemed excited. I'll know by Monday.

This morning, I woke up well. I got to talk to Archer for a little while, and I got some good sleep last night. But then I spent an hour or so cleaning my carpet because my poor dogs had diarrhea last night. (On the bright side, I figured out what was making them sick - the new food I just bought for them.) And then... I don't know. I actually felt like I accomplished something after I finished cleaning up - which was a good feeling - but I was just down. It's more than just feeling sorry for my dogs.

It's almost as though I felt good when I first got up because I wasn't fully awake yet; once my mind started to wake up and I became aware, my mood sank.

It was all I could do today to get showered, get enough to eat (I wasn't hungry), and get myself ready for the interview. Then I expended my entire day's worth of sociability in one 20 minute interview.

I put on my interrogator face.* The one where I shut out all my self-doubts, all awareness of my actual mood, and paint myself with a veneer of whatever mood will best suit my purposes. In this case, it was cheerful exuberance.

And now I'm done. Done for the day. Back in my comfy clothes.

~

*My previous occupation: Interrogator, US Army; a lifetime ago.

~

These are the days I could spend entirely in meditation. Or painting. Today, I have contemplated ...nothing. Not nothing, but... hm... I felt like my subconscious was in overdrive, while my conscious mind was numb and nearly blank. I just... breathe.

I don't really know what to do with these days, but it feels like a great time for divination.


I use a Druid Animal Oracle Deck, mostly. I have runes too, which I love, but lately I've been drawn more toward the cards.

I drew one card: the Bull, reversed... indicative of a lack of motivation.

Huh. Well, there ya have it.

The power of my cards to state the obvious is astounding.

Is there a deity of "duh"?


Update:
It's now much later in the evening. I decided to do another drawing, and it seemed worth updating the post to include it. This time I drew three cards:

Earth Dragon, reversed
Adder, reversed
Ram, reversed

Ok, first of all, I have never drawn the Earth Dragon before, nor have I ever drawn all three cards reversed. I've been using this deck consistently since ...2006? Or so. Anyway, a long damn time to have never drawn something before. And today, it comes up reversed. With two other reversed cards.

(Incidently, I love my deck. It's so blunt.)

Here's my take on this:

The Earth Dragon guards treasure; that treasure is our potential, our talents, maybe even our souls. And, the Earth Dragon is an aspect of our selves. So reversed, I consider this an indication that I'm not protecting myself - my soul - in a way that promotes my well-being. Now, in general, that could mean either that I was being too protective, or that I'm not being protective enough. I know: I'm laid bare, and vulnerable. As the first card in the draw, this represents the cause of my current state.

The Adder indicates healing through transformation; the Adder is symbolic of our spiritual energy. Reversed, it means I'm doing it wrong. The Adder is both poisonous and transformative; it is life, via death. Ah... sound familiar? I've been talking a lot about Hela lately. I am half-rotted, and parts of my soul have died, but I'm on a path of self-healing, and transformation. I'm becoming the person I always was, but never allowed myself to be. I've taken some steps, but have many more to go. Today, I think the Adder is telling me that I have allowed my depression to poison me, halting my progress. As the second card in the draw, this represents the emotional aspect of my current state.

The Ram, to me, means Home. But the Ram also tells a story of coming home through adversity, and of persevering despite obstacles. Reversed: I've allowed myself to stagnate. I stopped fighting, stopped working my way back home. As the third card in the draw, this represents the 'reality' of my current state.

As I said: this deck is quite blunt. No silk gloves on this one.

I thanked my cards, and put them away.
Tonight, my first step is to just breathe.
Today was a step backward;
tomorrow will be a step forward.
Just breathe, and put one foot in front of the other.

Hela Half-Rotted

Hela Half-Rotted, Lady of Death, Seer of Truth

She has been working on me for a long time, without my knowledge. Whether my ignorance was for the better or worse, I'm sure it was necessary. Regardless, I've come to recognize her over the past several months, and am gradually becoming her devotee as I realize just how deeply my life is connected to her.

Early in my life, I experienced something that warped my spirit, "killing" my soul as it existed and eliminating my opportunity for innocence. For much of my life, I have been half-rotted. I knew, and I didn't know. I knew I was "slightly neurotic" - I feared being alone, I had a love-hate relationship with sex (I tended to seek out sex which was more emotionally painful, masochistically), and I felt very much detached from my body in ways that seemed abnormal, even to me, though I didn't know how to change them. I was the only adult I knew who had to have a light on to sleep - and the closet door closed. I had, to put it succinctly, abandonment issues. Well, have.

My tattoos are, in a sense, a way for me to connect the important moments of my life with my body, to integrate my body with my soul. They are a way to feel the catharsis that connected me to my body that is my own, and my own in a healthy way. I don't need anyone else's participation - in a spiritual sense, even the tattooer is a facilitator, not a participant in my internal experience of the tattoo.

I had ups and downs with all these issues, predictably, but the lowest point was 2011. Pretty much the entire year. Behaviorally, the lowest point was that summer. Emotionally, I hit rock bottom on the 26th of December. (Yes, there was a specific event. No, I'm not going to go into that right now. This post is hard enough to write as it is.) I had heard of Hela at some point earlier in 2011, and was vaguely intrigued, but her lessons just didn't seem to apply to me (yeah, right). In November I started to see the connections. I started to see how my fears were twisting my reality. By the end of the year, I was experiencing a new type of soul-death: the kind that opened the doors which had always been there, hiding in the chained recesses of my heart. The kind of doors which, once opened, showed me myself.

'Truth shall set you free,' indeed.

The months since have been hard, but less hard than living the way I had been living, by far. I can honestly say that I am happier now than I have been since I was, perhaps, four years old. Maybe, this is the happiest I've ever been. Equally honestly, I could not have made it to this spiritual place without having gone through what I did.

I see the hand of Hela in my experience, an experience that saved my life.

In gratitude, I'm paying attention now. I feel her influence when I look at myself critically - not creating faults, nor shying away from those elements which I fear or dislike, but allowing myself to simply see truly who I am. With clear sight, I can accept what is good and change what is not. (Or at least I can work toward changing that which isn't good. Behaviors are easy to change; the fears which once caused those behaviors take a bit longer, I'm finding.)

I am learning to look at my half-rotted side as a lesson learned, something that is, but not something that defines me as a whole or that shapes my future.
~

This site has been of great value to me in my search for information about Hela.

~

Incidently, the "bones" nickname came a few years ago, and really gained momentum as a direct result of Archer's awesomeness. I didn't connect it with Hela until very recently. That's a different story.

~

This post was inspired by Hela, the Pagan Blog Project, and the letter H.

my favorite prayer

A Prayer to Hela,
In All Extremity

by Raven Kaldera

In the name of Darkness I call you,

Queen of Helheim, Lady Death,

Whose eye sees far into Ginnungagap,

Mantled in impassable shadow.

For I stand shrouded in wailing dark

As far as my burning eyes can see,

And the Sun rises bitterly with no light for my soul.

 

 

In the name of Decay I call you,

Hela-Half-Rotted, Lady Death,

Whose flesh is jeweled with carrion beetles,

Scented with the attar of corpses.

For my life is a rotted thing, begging

To be given a decent burial, to return

To the kindly earth, and all I once valued

Is hollow as a drum, withered as winter grass.

 

 

In the name of Cold I call you,

Throne of Ice, Lady Death,

Whose touch is chill that numbs all feeling,

Frozen as the winter clay.

For the frigid winds whip fierce about me,

And I wail my pain into their howling song,

The wasteland that was my life stretches

About me from horizon to horizon.

 

 

In the name of Silence I call you,

Barrow’s Mistress, Lady Death,

Whose voice is the sound of the stone being rolled

Before the open mouth of the echoing tomb.

For the words that I spoke, fine and bright

As the fluttering birds, they have fallen around me

Like small feathered bodies curling stiff, and nothing

I can say will rescue me from my troubles.

 

 

In the name of Bones I call you,

Skeletal Hand, Lady Death,

Whose eye strips away all that is false,

Leaving only bare and naked truth.

For under these layers of sorrow lies

The clean bones of my soul, which must be

Stripped and dried before a new life

Can once again be wrapped about them.

 

 

In the name of Loss I call you,

Soul-Guardian, Lady Death,

Whose arms reach out to take in all who come,

No matter their flaws, their fears, their crimes.

For I am lost in the labyrinth of despair

And I have come to the end of this road,

And I have nothing left to lose. I stand

At your gates, at the final outpost of my will,

And offer these tatters up to you in trust.

 

 

In the name of Death I call you,

Implacable One, Lady of Doom,

Whose Word is final as all Endings,

Who never speaks a lie.

Lady, take from me what you will,

So long as you take also these burdens,

Leave me empty, a vessel to be filled

With whatever the Divine Will would have.

 

 

In the name of Regeneration I call you,

For there is nowhere else left to turn,

And only You, Lady, can give this bitter gift.

Hail to Hel, Wisest of Wights,

May you look with compassionate grace upon me now.

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site © 2011 Raven Kaldera


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