spirits, Magic
Taylor Ellwood
The relationship between sacred kingship and ...

One of the books I’m reading lately is King, Warrior, Magician, Lover by Robert Moore and Doug Gillette. It’s a fascinating book that explores the archetypes of the mature and sacred masculine. This is currently part of the spiritual work that I’m engaged in as I explore my own relationship with masculinity and heal the ancestoral and contemporary wounds that I’m becoming aware of as it relates to how masculinity is treated and perceived in modern times.

One of the aspects I’m exploring in particular is related to sacred kingship and the land. I am in the process of exploring the new city and surrounding areas that I live in. While I’ve lived here for a year, I didn’t have much opportunity until recently to really begin exploring the area and developing a relationship with the land. I find it fitting and useful that part of the process has also involved cultivating a relationship with the land, particularly on the basis of the relationship has with their home and how that relationship plays out in sacromagical work one does in connecting with the land.

balance

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What does it mean to be grounded?

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In an interview I did with Liz Worth, we ended up discussing the need to find balance in your life and not go overboard with your spiritual work. It got me thinking about what it really means to be grounded, especially in relationship to my recent article on recovering from spiritual burnout. I know from my own experiences and what it’s like to go overboard, because I’ve done it with magic and with being a workaholic sometimes. I’ve had to learn the necessity of achieving a better sense of groundedness in what I do through having experiences where I overdid it.

I’ve been reflecting on my own sense of balance quite a bit over the last few years, because I’ve had to make some changes in how I approach my spiritual work, my writing, and other facets of my life. I’ve realized that being grounded isn’t simply making sure you eat a bit of food after a ritual or a do a banishing. Being grounded is connecting to your life in a meaningful way that doesn’t always involve a sense of having to do something, fix something, manifest something, or otherwise deal with whatever seems to be driving you.

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Of Wounds and Tattoos

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In a previous post, I showed off my most recent tattoo. Since showing it off, I've had an interesting, if somewhat painful experience that I want to relate. A couple days after I'd gotten the tattoo, I had three sores appear around the tattoo. One sore was actually in the tattoo, but on a spot that hadn't been inked. Another appeared in a straight line below it, and another appeared at an angle, where you essentially had a triangle. Without getting into too much TMI, the sores ended up infected, with one becoming an abscess. The timing of this was interesting. Kat, my wife, thinks that my body was responding to the tattoo and releasing toxicity. Given that I'd gotten all the work done in a 3 week period, I can believe that, but at the same time I can't help but wonder if it was also a demonstration of what the tattoo represents: Balance in Identity. Achieving balance means facing and releasing toxicity in your life. It means recognizing where you've allowed yourself to be held up by your own issues.

In meditating on the wounds that appeared, I realized that they represented the work I'd done and continue to do with my elemental balancing ritual. I've worked through a lot of internal toxicity and cleaned it out of my life. It's been painful, but it's also freed me of so much of what I was holding in. Those physical embodiments of the toxicity reminded me of all that work. They're also a reminder that such work can be ongoing.

In other news...

Recently Immanion Press released its latest Anthology: Shades of Faith. You can order the book via this website or via Amazon. Here's a brief description of what it's about:

Shades of Faith: Minority Voices in Paganism is an anthology that encompasses the voices and experiences of minorities within the Pagan community and addresses some of the challenges, stereotyping, frustrations, talents, history and beauties of being different within the racial constructs of typical Pagan or Wiccan groups.