Anxiety tips for COVID 19, Spiritually Speaking

Photo by Alina Vilchenko on Pexels.com

What with the sudden influx of people checking out my mental illness posts, I took a wild guess that people were reaching out for help. So, behold! I’ve decided to put together some self-help tips that try and take into consideration our limitations due to the pandemic. I mainly focused upon anxiety and worry, as it seems that’s what most people are dealing with in these trying times.

• smudge/burn incense that is purifying and banishing of all negative energy. I am particularly prone to burning cinnamon (yes, the spice). Just pile it into a little pyramid (no bigger than an inch tall or wide, otherwise it might be too much heat for your holder), and light with a match.
• Do a guided meditation (like this one) where you visualize yourself giving up all your worries to your favorite spirit.
  • Sit down comfortably. Close your eyes and relax. Or cry a little bit, that’s okay too. But whatever you do, relax and let your emotions come bubbling up to the surface. Feel them, hold them. Place your hands on your chest and try and, stretching your hands forward, visualize yourself taking these worries as tangible objects out of your chest and holding them out. Now, pray to a healing deity (my thoughts go to Bast or Sekhmet for this one). Ask them to take your worries away, to heal them and guide you through this pandemic safely.
    • The prayer can go something lie “I pray to you, O Great Sekhmet. Here are my worries, my inner plague. Please erase them from me, leaving me wiser and calmer. Let me, by your guiding grace, pass through this pandemic unharmed.”
  • After this, clap your hands and dust them off away from yourself. They are now empty and your worries are symbolically gone. Rest, focusing on feelings of rejuvenation and calmness.

• Paint a Dagaz rune on your scarf/mask to help keep the virus out. You can use consecrated water to trace it invisibly as well.
• Meditate on ice, Isa rune, to calm down and help you reach stillness. Visualize the rune in your chest, wherever you feel your worry the most. Breathe it in and feel it filling you, swelling and cooling down your worry. Exhale and feel it absorbing your worries and transforming them into cold calm.
• Write down on a piece of paper a list of all things that are worrying you about this pandemic. Light a candle to Sekhmet or your favorite deity (simply say “I devote this candle to ___, to function as a channel of true speech between us” as you light it, or use your favorite invocation), and light the paper with the candle. Allow it to burn as you pray for her powers to destroy not only your worries but all harm that may come to you through this pandemic.
  • Prayer could go something like this. “O Great Sekhmet, here is a list of all that worries me, all that I fear. Please, with your burning powers, O Great Eye of Ra, destroy my worries and all harm that may come to me. Keep me and mine safe from this pandemic, this virus that engulfs the world.”
• Offer up a prayer for all affected by the disease, such as This Brilliant One

 

I hope this was useful ❤  If you are suffering from something particular and want a prayer or ideas on how to cope with it spiritually, feel free to message me (I can send it to you privately) @ mdaoust245@gmail.com

Photo by Alina Vilchenko on Pexels.com

Who Am I?

So I’ve gotten some new followers lately on social media! Always a great thing! And, as is customary, I’ve decided to do a ‘who am I’ post, just to introduce myself to all these lovely people who have decided to follow me. This post will be doubled up on my Instagram.

So who am I? Well I’m an author, vicious mental health advocate, and a self-dedicated pagan priest. And as it comes to writing this post, I’m stumped. I don’t know what to say, really. How can I summarize myself? It’s like describing a box that you’re stuck on the inside of. But I’m going to try and tell you what’s inside the box.

First things first -> I love writing. Writing once saved my life, keeping me from my suicidal ideations. So I don’t take my stories too lightly, let’s put it that way. I love them, I love writing them, and I really care about making them good and reaching people with them.

Second things second -> I’m pretty darn spiritual. I live my religion, Wicca, and can get really intense about it. Which is why getting called by various spirits can sometimes make life confusing, but hey. I do my best. I’m part of the monastic movement in polytheism, as well as the wave of self-dedicated priest/esses, as well as those who cover their heads.

Third things third -> I no longer cover my head full-time, but do cover and dress up and makeup for ritual occasions. Why? Because I feel called to. So I do. That simple. I kind of wish I had the inner strength and calling to cover full-time, because sometimes it really does feel good to cover. But hey, that’s not today.

Fourth things fourth -> I am a fierce mental health advocate and domestic abuse survivor and feminist. I try and tie all these together, but I mainly rail against nasty esoteric views that poison paganism in regards to mental health. As someone who survived mental illness and had an especially hard time due to these beliefs that were impressed upon me, I really really get up in arms about mental illness rights and poisonous outlooks.

Fifth things fifth -> I actually do have a sense of humor, and am really kind. It might not show, but I generally make people laugh IRL and do my best to make them happy and smiling whenever they’re with me. So as much as I might come off as a hardass online, it’s just because writing’s my best medium and the swiftest way for me to clearly lay out my thoughts. But when it comes to taking care of people? I’ve literally had a stranger come up to me during a street festival and ask for help in regards to their mental health, and I kept in contact for months trying to help them.

Sixth thing? Just in case none of you know – I am transgender! That means I am going from being a woman to being a man. So when you refer to me, it’s he/him. 🙂

Fun facts!

• I like wearing fake piercings, doing makeup, and doing my nails on occasion.
• I love gardening, but gardening does not always love me!
• Similarly, I love drawing, but it doesn’t always turn out the way I want it to! Which leads me to the fact that…
• I’m pretty harsh on myself when it comes to stuff I care about. I’m not really a perfectionist, but I want my stuff to be good.
• I’m terrible with colors. I just have a really hard time coloring in a picture, understanding how colors work, and pairing up complementary colors together.
• I love my puddy cat. We snuggle lots (as my instagram feed testifies).
• I love baking. I’m generally pretty okay at it too!
• I tend to break coffee machines. No joking, we used a french press for a few years because I broke three coffee machines in a row, no idea how. They just – broke.
• I try and play guitar. Try being the key word here.
• speaking of which, the first song I tried to learn was the ‘chocobo song’ from final fantasy, just to irritate my wife (she’s heard that song too much!).
• When I was young and watching disney movies, I always wanted to be the villain. Especially Gaston. I never wanted him to die haha.

Infrastructure Matters and Esoteric Shops Don’t

Now I don’t mean to offend any esoteric shop owners, but those shops are practically useless. Did I upset someone? Well I don’t care. I am starting to really despise esoteric shops. To me, they feel like the bane of all existence, and the fact that they are the ‘center’ of pagan communities is a perfect symbol of all that is wrong with paganism.

Hear me out here. What, in an esoteric shop, do we as pagans really need? Yeah, yeah, it’s fun once in a while to buy yourself a cauldron and a new whoop-de-doo-dad. Whoopee. But then what? You go there once in a while to * buy stuff *,  chat with the store owner, and you leave. If you’re lucky, there’s classes offered and you *buy them * and then go home.

Whooo. How interactive. You *buy* and that’s it.

Now I don’t want to split hairs here but I’m poor. Most pagans think they are poor. So why the absolute fuck do we buy so much stuff? How come we, the ‘poor pagans who are so down to earth’, have let our religion be commercialized like this? Why is a SHOP the emblem of our society?

Yeah, yeah, there’s hidden covens that operate in living rooms. But they’re exactly that -> hidden, and only available to a few.

Y’all, all we have is shops right now. Shops that are super fucking expensive too. Shops that don’t reflect us, really. Because if they did, there would be seeds and gardening tools in them, as well as cooking implements. But nooooo, they’ve only got expensive white sage for you to buy. Does that really reflect us? Does it? It’s like saying a candy shop represents a person’s needs.

You know, as a poor, sick, person, all those fancy crystals and doo-dads are out of reach for me. All I can do is go into the shop and say ‘ooo, pretty’, and walk back out. Because it’s a SHOP. Because it’s only there for people to *buy stuff* when what we need is support and social networking. Why haven’t I seen seed swaps happening in these esoteric shops? Why not skill shares? Gardening classes? Children’s summer activities? No?

I lived in a town with over 5 esoteric shops in it. SHOPS. And no infrastructure. None. Zippo. No casual get-togethers. No actual support systems in it. It showed. No one knew anyone, and the community was insanely fragmented. Everyone thought they were the *only * pagan around. But hey, the shops made business.

A shop is a business. Infrastructure is networks, is support. Infrastructure is what we need, not shops. We’re a religious group, and we shouldn’t let commercial endeavors be our center. Isn’t there more to us than that?

SHouldn’t the ‘an harm ye none’ Wiccans be the biggest peace activists around? Shouldn’t the Asatru be having parenting classes on how to do it within a heathen perspective? Shouldn’t we have, at the bare minimum, seed swaps? People, come on. Please, let there be more to us than just a shop. Get out. Grow. Don’t just buy.