The Source of My Fear

[judiss]

from what I've personally seen, magick and entities do not take too kindly to dabblers.

You've also witnessed something like my supervisor's experience? Please, if you're comfortable sharing, share - I'm very interested.

[Oceanos]

Just go read my introduction post for reference, I've dealt with plenty in the past, some of which was probably due to dabbling at first before getting more serious with it.

[laalbieglna]

Hi laalbieglna, thank you for the thorough response. I want to start by saying there is no hate in my heart for YHVH, there is just no love.

Yeah, I feel you on that, but I am trying to be open to the possibility, though mostly it's radio silence for me there (I've done a lot of cultural and intellectual work with Judaism, and "dabbled" in the Rabbi Jill Hammer/Kohenet and Earth-Based Judaism movements, but have felt mostly distaste for the One God, biblical and talmudic, hard patriarchal monotheism -- but I also know it's not the only way (and never has been according to secular biblical studies

So I guess, on the topic of my fears, another aspect of what I'm so afraid of is ending up like them. What if I'm just as misguided as them? What if it's all in my head?

I can only speak for myself, but for me that fear never goes away permanently -- it goes on sometimes lengthy hiatus when "leveling up" spiritually or otherwise having very connected, confirming experiences, and then... it always reappears, recycled and I have to deal with it again. I am guessing this is a necessary part of my personal growth and shadow work. There are no easy escapes from challenges, it turns out in my experience, only powering through until they are completely dealt with and integrated, and there is no exact timeline for that.

You've actually met Jesus? What was that like? How could discern that it was Jesus since I've read that visual representations of deities are almost always inaccurate, misleading, or varies between people. I'm not invalidating your experience; I just would like to know! (If I could privately message you, I would. But I can't apparently because I'm light blue) Of course, if you'd rather not talk about it I understand - volunteer ethics and all that.
Thanks in advance!

I'm fine talking about it in a general sense. With the discernment, I'd already had very intense and direct personal experiences with deities acting as independent entities, so I recognized it as that type of experience, but it was well after being "converted", if you will, to a hard polytheism. Like with other deities, it wasn't so much the physical representation -- for me, when I've had an experience of a deity "looking" a certain way, it's more like a symbol or signature they're using, like they're anchoring their energy to something you'll recognize to speed through the introductions and get to the real conversation. For me, recognition has always been about a specific pattern of their energy, like their "flavor".

It's a weird story, so I am just acknowledging that I know how this can sound, but this is what happened. I'd begun seriously working with Loki, and then with Baphomet in a very tutelary sense. Now I definitely thought I'd arrived -- shadow work? hashing through my personal issues? No Problem! I'm there! I'm good at this! I've got nothing to hide from myself! ... Let me tell you that Baphomet (and Loki, also) is very, very excellent at finding that one thing that causes you the most pain and that you'd hide yourself from at all costs, dragging it out into the light, and rubbing your face in it continuously until it's dealt with completely.

This particular thing was tied deeply to my being baptized and raised Catholic and rejecting that path and everything related to it completely, and blaming it in large part for my pain and poor choices. He was very specific that I'd have to go back to the source -- vulnerably, not confrontationally -- to receive healing. And that's how I ended up at a Catholic retreat. I am not going to lie that I literally yelled and screamed and begged "anything but that!", but I ultimately was all, "okay, I'll do it, but that doesn't mean I am buying all of this, I'm just showing up there and that's all".

--here is where I had to stop to feed a kid breakfast and help my partner with his 4 years of overdue taxes, and so the system logged me off and erased my beautifully edited, final answer --

This retreat uses a method called "Living Scriptures", which I assumed was a Bible study curriculum. Nope. This is a system of guided meditation and ritual that would be at home at any Reclaiming even. I was seriously like, "Who on this leadership team studied with Starhawk?????" It was really an intensive experience of introspection, meditation, ritual and spellcraft. But that wasn't where my encounter happened.

It happened after 2 days of this intensive ritual and just brutally honest self-reflection, in the shower where I was still miserable, and it was just so personal and gentle and ... humble... is a very close word but not exact. His message for me was 100% about accepting forgiveness and healing, ultimately also about then being able to extend it to others, but in that moment just about allowing myself to accept it. It was so nurturing and caring and gentle and so much like being a hurt little kid and having someone who loves you clean you off and put you to bed. And that is where I am leaving this because all of the beautiful insight and delightful wordsmithing of my first answer is erased and I have to dress and clean a toddler and take him to a government office right now to locate his SSN for tax purposes.

[Darth Moronius]

amazing experiens

[judiss]

Thank you very much, laalbieglna! It is a busy time for everyone, it seems so thank you extra for taking the time for typing that all out twice! Your experience certainly is interesting and that Catholic retreat does sound very unconventional - do you think, even though they work with the belief in Jesus, that what they're doing counts as following the LHP?

[Passchendaele]

As far as your friend...well, part of my answer is that people often begin to dabble without fully grasping the reality of the entities they're inviting. For example, how many people do you know who are self-proclaimed Christians, but who have never once had a direct experience of being in palpable contact with their God? Most people around us inherit their religion, and literally do not expect to have a direct contact until the day they die.

I think most of us probably began in that place, and when contact does happen, especially if we only have a single, rigid way of interpreting experiences according to a very narrow and exclusive set of beliefs, it can be disruptive and terrifying. As other posters have already stated, it doesn't all have to be sludges and parasites, but those are also a reality, especially for someone who isn't emotionally grounded, is inexperienced in general, and doesn't yet have a spiritual discipline that includes energetic defense and spiritual and emotional hygiene, as it were.

An experience doesn't have to be objectively "evil" or dangerous to be subjectively terrifying. It sounds like your friend had a single context for his dabbling -- "black magic". He was set up to have terrifying experiences if he had any experiences at all, regardless of the entities and their intentions. I don't pretend to know which entities and what intentions those actually were, but consider that if you can only understand overtly paranormal experiences as evil, threatening, and frightening, that is the experience you'll have, no matter which entity it is, even if they're just trying to get your attention the only way that they really can; though let it be said that we've often been fed a very fluffy, babyish interpretation of what a god's help is supposed to look like, and it can be very shocking and alarming when the paces they put you through, personal work they expect from you, and changes they trigger in your life actually feel threatening and challenging. They demand much, beginning with unwavering respect, and potentially leading all the way through dismantling your identity and putting it back together piece by piece. So they also require an enormous amount of trust and long-haul personal commitment.

I get it. I started out as a Christianity-hating, truly embittered sort of "all gods are manifestations of the one" wiccanish pagan. I ended up a hard-core devotional polytheist whose practice includes demonolatry and who's been baptized in a Pentecostal church in all sincerity out of gratitude because Jesus is one of the deities I've had a direct, life-changing experience with -- since the polytheism.

If it's any help at all, I would wish for you that you are able to not fear, and not blame that particular god for the shenanigans of his purported followers. If you can, accept them and respect where they are on their paths as you go your own way. This is about you and your relationships with your holy powers -- it doesn't ever have to be about the people surrounding you.

If it is important to you to know this due to your upbringing, he loves everyone as they are and does not demand that you change who you are, only that you walk in his compassion and accept his grace. If not, know that there are deities who are involved in your life already and they care about you and are going to help you walk your path as you are willing to discover and follow it. Be safe, discern the character of entities as you would that of your fellow human beings, but do not be afraid that you are selling yourself into damnation by going down a path different from the one you were raised with.

Dear Laalbieglna:

An entire galaxy of "thank you's" for your post. In this culture, the "reset" button on anything even vaguely supernatural is F.E.A.R. "Be scared of it first, blame it on "The Devil", second, and pretend it never happened, third." My relationship with christianity has been, on the whole, a very mixed bag. With negative experiences seemingly out-weighing positive ones. But part of that was a function of the people involved. Very Nasty people who enjoyed inflicting suffering on those too young to defend themselves.

It did not automatically mean there was no Truth in christianity, but that was something I had to discover for myself. In doing so, I found my Path. I do not reject christianity, it simply is not relevant to my life anymore. Parts of it I found were true. I incorporated these into my "world view", so to speak, the rest I simply let go. I had to or I would have been consumed by my hatred. It was Very Real and Very Deep and Very,Very Unhealthy.

[Cerber]

Did he simply encounter "parasites" or sludges? Or, of course, does it just sound like he's mentally unstable and never "dabbled" at all?

Theoretically you can pick them up by walking the streets or sometimes they might just randomly walk into your home.

Did something like that actually ever happened to you or anybody you personally know?
Theoretically my kids might get hit by a meteor on their way to school, but that's not something I would warn them of while saying goodbye: "Beware of Meteors!"

[judiss]

Did he simply encounter "parasites" or sludges? Or, of course, does it just sound like he's mentally unstable and never "dabbled" at all?

Theoretically you can pick them up by walking the streets or sometimes they might just randomly walk into your home.

Did something like that actually ever happened to you or anybody you personally know?
Theoretically my kids might get hit by a meteor on their way to school, but that's not something I would warn them of while saying goodbye: "Beware of Meteors!"

Can't speak for Aprophis' experience, but I did listen to this informative (albeit unreasonably long) interview with Akelta regarding sludges and how they seem to be ubiquitous (shared with me by Oceanos): " onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[laalbieglna]

that Catholic retreat does sound very unconventional - do you think, even though they work with the belief in Jesus, that what they're doing counts as following the LHP?

I wouldn't call it LHP...coming out of a path where these are positive descriptors, I would call it magic or witchcraft, but I am pretty sure they wouldn't.
I think American Christianity, especially majority-white American denominations are peculiar -- globally it seems to me that mixing magic with belief in Jesus is the norm, not the exception, and Catholics are a bit more likely to do it than some other groups, but definitely they have entire apologia devoted to explaining why it isn't magic when it's them and it's focused on Jesus and Mary.

[Passchendaele]

that Catholic retreat does sound very unconventional - do you think, even though they work with the belief in Jesus, that what they're doing counts as following the LHP?

I wouldn't call it LHP...coming out of a path where these are positive descriptors, I would call it magic or witchcraft, but I am pretty sure they wouldn't.
I think American Christianity, especially majority-white American denominations are peculiar -- globally it seems to me that mixing magic with belief in Jesus is the norm, not the exception, and Catholics are a bit more likely to do it than some other groups, but definitely they have entire apologia devoted to explaining why it isn't magic when it's them and it's focused on Jesus and Mary.

I love that about catholicism. "Spirits are bad. Be afraid of them. They'll eat your soul or give you toe-nail fungus....Saints? Angels? Uh...think of it this way, there are bad parts of town, and good parts of town, all in the same town, but...in the "bad" part are people with no money, they drink and fornicate and hardly ever go to church, and when they do, it's a protestant church. (boooooo) In the good part are people with money. The more money, the gooder they are! Angels can be found in the good part, Demons in the bad. You can't be sure which is which cuz Demons are tricksters! Be afraid, be Very Afraid."