emotional wreck | bloodteethandflame

3 AM

3am on YouTube:

As it is with most people, I thought this song was about a romantic relationship.

But when this acoustic version of ‘3am’ came across my suggested YouTube feed today, I actually assumed it was going to be ‘3am (Breathe)’ by Ana Nalick.

Instead, I was surprised to see Rob Thomas at the piano, informing his audience that it was actually meant to be a song about his mother. And he continued on about how when he was 12 years old, his mother was dying of cancer.

Upon hearing that, I suddenly burst into tears.

Not that my mother is dying of cancer, mind you, but I am estranged from her (for reasons which many of my longtime readers may be aware –but I don’t feel like repeating the long and sordid story of our toxic relationship right now….)
Though suffice to say, I sometimes find myself uselessly mourning for the relationship we did not have.

Related to this, I have been dreaming of my father – who did die of cancer – 10 years ago as of last month.
I have been dreaming of him a lot lately…and in every dream, he has come to me asking for me to make amends with my mother.

And of course, sometimes I cry about that too. As much as I would like to oblige my father, I am a stubborn bastard just as much as my mother is. As well, while I know that what is wrong between us could likely have been fixed long ago if one of us could relent, I am tired of being the only one who relents …over and over.

You see, my mother is one of those people who can never admit to the wrongness of her behavior, and so it is unfortunate that she has continued to insist that she has ‘never done anything wrong.’

Thus I haven’t any contact with her since 2009.

And so here I am.

1 Comment

April 11, 2017

I believe in pandoramancy, mark 2.

So.
Something worrisome is happening…

but there is nothing much I can do at 9:18PM EST

…but if you know me, you know that I’m worrying anyway.
And then, my son surprises me with this inspired piece of pandoramancy.
And that’s how I knew that this had to be today’s Song of the Day:

I laughed – because I love this video – but then I burst into tears.

I don’t know how he could have known.

And yet the message – that everything is going to be OK – is something that I didn’t expect to hear, and yet it is a message is one that I needed to hear so badly right at the moment….

Because…yeah.

The worry.

Sometimes the worry overwhelms me.

But the Universe seems to want me to know

Even if the sky is falling down
I know that we’ll be safe and sound
We’re safe and sound

Oh…and seeing those little singing cotton balls especially helped cheer me up a little. ❤

December 29, 2016

Worldbreaker.

Everything’s fine.

Then, everything’s *not* fine.

2016 has been a rollercoaster..and I don’t think that it has just been a rollercoaster for me.

Look at the rest of the world, I suppose.

It would seem that everyone is struggling with something…not just me.

Not just my struggles.

~~~

I haven’t been posting, mainly because I’ve been keeping to the relative safety of writing in my notebooks, because 2016 has brought so many changes to my life that when I look back upon where I was, emotionally and spiritually, on this day in 2015, I am agog at how much has changed in my relationships, my attitudes, my writing….hell, even my devotional/spiritual practices.

As a matter of fact, so much has changed in my devotional practice that my head is sort of… spinning.

It’s been an interesting year, to say the least.

~~~

At the end of 2015, I was coming out of a major depressive episode.

Certain aspects of my life were either stagnant or evolving in a direction that I didn’t want to travel. I felt stuck and sad and angry.

I had decided to end relationships with several persons whom I’d come to over-value so much that I’d thought of these folks as the basis of my spiritual community….so deciding to cut ties with those friends felt like cutting ties with my sense of community.

As well, I felt stagnant in my spiritual relationships. I needed something to change but I didn’t know what or how

Though I had hope for 2016, I’d never in a million years expected the changes that were in store for me regarding my marriage, my circle of friends (or whom I would have considered my circle of friends), how I’d come to spend my free time,the people, places and things I would come to value, the skills that I would develop or the way that my devotional/spiritual practices would be completely overhauled.

Yes, my spiritual practices would suffer a complete overhaul in 2016.

And that is why I have chosen WorldBreaker as the title of this post.

Because, oddly enough, in retrospect, one of the only constants I see in the pattern of 2015 to 2016 was …Loki

And yes, that is true…I am working with Loki now.*

Though in late December 2015, I’d even gone as far as to pack up all of my altars -including His – because I was feeling disconnected from all of Them.

I was throwing what was essentially a tantrum of enormous spiritual proportions.

I was trying so hard to feel and to do, and yet all I could feel was an immense sense of frustration and disconnection.

I was feeling what I thought that I was supposed to feel and I was doing what I thought was the ‘work’ that I needed to do…

And yet I was ….not.

Though I will admit what I did feel was this:

“ I wish you all had one neck and I had my hands around it.”

(Those, by the way, are the second to last words of convicted murderer Carl Panzram, just before he was executed at Leavenworth Penitentiary in 1930)

(Do you see the WorldBreaker yet?)

Because that, my friends, is how I felt (inwardly, of course) about the whole business of not just the day to day functionings of my mundane life, but my spiritual life as well.

In late 2015, I definitely felt that if Life were a person, I wanted to choke that motherfucker out…and hard.

But I am not a violent person, so I could not even begin to guess where those feelings of rage were coming from at the time.

But I do…now.

(Yep. That was me…being upset. And oh…not working on my shit. But boy, did I think I was!)

So, what changed?

Well, I can’t exactly write a recipe book now, can I?

It was my journey from 2015 on and through all of 2016 that required a change in attitude towards a lot of situations that I didn’t particularly like that involved people that I didn’t particularly like.

I was entrenched in a battle of control and blame in my mundane life, and I was believing that these situations were somehow within my realm of control… but they were not.

I was the face of acceptance on the surface, but underneath all of that, I was angry and withholding.

I kept telling myself that I had let go of the past, but I had not….not entirely.

I was full of assumptions and waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I was waiting and hiding and grumbling to myself.

I had expectations based upon assumptions, and I was feeding an ugly vicious cycle of blame and insecurity.

In short, I was living in the past, but thinking that I was moving on.

I thought I was open. I thought I was being accepting and fair and loving and generous. I thought that I was letting go. I told myself constantly that I was holding myself accountable. I was convinced that it was I who was fair and open and honest…and others were not.

It wasn’t me who refused to be, it was them.

And in my spiritual life – well, there’s a mirror. I was insecure, tentative…also angry.

I had so much stuff on my altars. I was meditating every day. I felt like I was constantly giving Them time, giving Them energy, giving Them thought.

So why was I having the dark night of the soul? Why was I feeling a fallow time? Why did I feel so disconnected?

Because…you refuse.

You refuse to be open.

You refuse to be generous.

You do not allow….

You do not permit….

It will begin…when you begin.

BEGIN.

And so, in 2016, I began without even being aware of what I was beginning.

(Enter the WorldBreaker, stage left.)

Looking back upon the year, I realize that there were many occasions wherein I was thrust into many uncomfortable situations.

I look back upon these uncomfortable moments and I recall feeling forced to explain myself in many ways.

A lot of these moments featured me being forced to examine myself – my social anxieties, my prejudices, my decisions, my beliefs.**

But 2016 also rewarded me – the year even brought me a lot of growth, and even some new friends – or rather, I re-connected with myself in re-connecting with several ‘old’ friends – which led to my social circle increasing exponentially and unexpectedly at the same time.

As well, 2016 brought me joy in unexpected places (Arizona) and heartache in others (Washington DC)…but in the end, the slow change toward actually letting go of my need to control/create a specific outcome led to unexpected and entirely unforeseen outcomes.

While I do not have a lot of the same people in my life that I had had in 2015, I do have people in 2016.

As well, in 2016, I have done things that I never thought that I would do, I experienced things that I’d never dreamed of experiencing before, and craziest of all, I am actually working with yet another God that I had once insisted that I would *never* work with.

(Hel, as recently as two months ago, I would have refused to even look at Him, let alone work with Him in any way.)

Funny, how things can change so completely and so abruptly, eh?

But that, my friends, is the story of a decision for another day entirely. 😉

So that was the trajectory of my 2016.

A year of rapid, dramatic (sometimes even melodramatic) emotional and spiritual change for me.

Courtesy of a relentless Breaker of Worlds.

Hail Loki, indeed ❤

~~~~

*In retrospect, I realize that up to a point, 2012-2015 was essentially ‘making a good show of working with Loki’ compared to actually ‘working with’ Loki

**I felt ashamed, exposed…and about three months ago, it peaked in that a few folks even vilified me for speaking my mind, for writing what I wrote in this blog. And yes, it stopped me. A lot.

2 Comments

November 8, 2016

A thing about…Heather(s)

(From dream of 29 October:)

I was talking to Him about conduits, and He was encouraging.

Then, suddenly…I heard V talking loudly.

So loudly, it woke me up.

I rolled over to look at V, and he had his eyes open.

He seemed wide awake, and he seemed to be looking right at me.

Then, V said to me:

“Just be me. Come… just be me.”

And that made no sense to me.

Then, V shut his eyes, and rolled over.

And even stranger – about 20 minutes later – V awakened, got out of the bed, and stumbled towards the toilet.

Evidently V had no memory of what he’d said.

~~~

I don’t know why we talk about these things.

Yes, I’m not certain as to how I feel about what He says about conduits.**

But I don’t like the part – the insinuation that I’m not sure if it’s an insinuation at all – that I *must* consider these things, even if I don’t talk about it.

~~~

Years ago, I wrote that people named Heather are always conceited in some way.

Heathers have a desire to be important.

And I think about what He’d said during a recent meditation, concerning the reasons for performing seidhr.

And He had this to say about a Heather I used to know – that is, L.O.L*:

Heather wanted recognition from the community.

Meanwhile, I just wanted a community of people to with whom to connect.

~~~

But after dream-interactions like this, I ask myself:

Do I want something more?

Do I want more than to be seen?

I feel shame over wanting recognition at all.

I feel selfish.

I ask myself why.

I just want a quiet community where I don’t have to talk about things with others unless I want to.

But I do know something about myself and that is …

To check myself, I often feel the need to share my experiences:

Is this happening to you too?

What does it mean?

Does He want this from you too?

What does it mean?

~~~

*(Local Other Lokean, named Heather)

** Edited to add.

5 Comments

August 24, 2016

Gold.

“At some point in time, I was a new thing. I was a thing that had not been hurt, had not been beaten, had not been cast out, had not been rejected. Maybe it was only for a day or two (or maybe more) but I dare to think that, once upon a time, I was even loved wholly and completely, if even for a moment.

We all start this way: new. We all start with our hearts in tact, our spirits strong, our connection to soul and self: solid. We start with our ten fingers and ten toes and we hold that newness for as long as we can. Or for as long as life lets us….” – from Meadow DeVor’s latest post.

The above quote is taken from today’s incredibly powerful post from Meadow Devor concerning the Japanese artisan practice of kintsugi (otherwise known Kintsukuroi :(金繕い) [Japanese: golden repair] – the artistic method of repairing broken ceramic vessels with lacquers imbued with gold, silver or platinum…

And how kintsukuroi can be seen as a metaphor for spiritual self-repair and moving beyond trauma toward healing and wholeness.

July 12, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 11: Separated.

Being still sick with this flu, I spent most of this day in an almost meditative haze.

As in, I meditated heavily upon my follow-up to this entry.

And this is what came up:

Who bows to whom?

We are both switches, you see.

But I don’t know if He is talking about the relationship between He and Odin

… or if He is talking about the relationship between Himself and me.

~~~

The first thing that came up in my email feed was this powerful video post from a blog I follow:

Gage Wallace: How We Have Learned to Love

and how the poet has allowed words to separate him – how words separate us all – from facing each other in love.

That post was followed within moments by Jolene Poseidonae’s post on how ‘the heart must go first. [and] The brain may follow’ **

~~~

What I took from these two posts was to mean was that I have allowed this little writing project of mine to limit myself in my words already.

I promised to write and yet I have allowed the words to separate Loki and I from each other.

He doesn’t really care what words I use, as long as I write the truth of the story.

And the truth of the story is difficult for me to admit to because it requires a certain amount of writing with an openness and eye towards vulnerability that I am not used to.

I have begged Him to take me deeper and yet it has been the words that have always separated us.

When I taught other kinksters about words as ordeal and how words can make thoughts manifest –

How with the use of words alone, one can create powerful connections!

I was also acutely aware of the concept that Gage Wallace speaks of concerning about how the distance between lovers can be created just as easily — created by the words on the tiny screen of an iPhone.

Words can bring together and words can separate. Names, titles, concepts, aspects….do they matter?

Well, it all matters just as much as it doesn’t matter, because words have a fluidity of meaning and power than is entirely dependent upon context and meaning.

We give words the power they have, and yet once they are said, or heard, their power becomes dependent upon others’ understanding of meaning and context.

Whether one is having a conversation or an argument, words are means by which access is given to thoughts, ideas, and feelings.

We connect with our words. We encourage with our words. We open up to others with our words.

But we can also wound with our words. We can shut down connection with words. We can separate ourselves from others with labels, titles, names, designations. We can lie, confuse, obfuscate meaning. We can hide behind our words.

Words can open and words can limit.

~~~

When Loki first came to me, almost from the beginning, I wanted to know Who He was.

And He wouldn’t tell me.

So I put words on Him:

Shadow in the Dark.

Invisible friend.

Creature in the woods. A shadow being that pursued me over a dark, empty field in a series of haunting dreams.

The Trois Frere Sorceror.

Teacher.

Magician.

Lover.

God.

But I realize that Loki encompasses all of these words…and yet, none of these words.

~~~~

**I love that last line, by the way. It is a perfect description of where my devotional practice with Loki seems to be going this month. I was equally tempted to use those words as the title for today’s post.

2 Comments

July 11, 2016

I don’t know how.

I’m sorry.

I don’t know how to follow up yesterday’s post.

So, if you are looking for the continuation of yesterday’s ‘to be continued’

– you aren’t going to find it here today.

I’m sorry.

~~~

I have been thinking all day of how I could write the continuation…but it isn’t happening today.

I made the mistake of going over some old posts from my notebooks from 2013, thinking that I could glean something from the pages of rage and despair.

He is correct, you know.

I wasn’t learning anything from all the pain that I’d felt – that I’d sought to feel – back then.

Reading all the pages today of that awful story – my story – was heart-wrenching.

I know what I said. I know what I promised.

I just can’t deliver today.

Perhaps…tomorrow.

April 20, 2016

A dark and scary place.

It has been a dark and scary place within my head these past few days.

It’s quite possible that I may be depressed, or perhaps, I am manic.

Either way, I have been stubborn and negative with those I love, and that has been especially true of my actions towards others today.

And for that, I am sorry.

Then, this image came across my Facebook feed:

This sculpture was created by Ukrainian artist Alexander Milov for Burning Man.

The Wealth of Wisdom on Instagram posted this description:

“One of the most powerful art pieces from Burning Man: A sculpture of two adults after a disagreement, sitting with their backs to each other. Yet, the inner child in both of them simply wants to connect. Age has many beautiful gifts but one we could live without is the pride and resentment that we hold onto when have conflicts with others. The forgiving free spirit of children is our true nature. Remember this when you feel stubborn.”

Here are the artist’s words concerning his powerful piece:

“It demonstrates a conflict between a man and a woman as well as the outer and inner expression of human nature. Their inner selves are executed in the form of transparent children, who are holding out their hands through the grating. As it’s getting dark (night falls) the children start to shine. This shining is a symbol of purity and sincerity that brings people together and gives a chance of making up when the dark time arrives.”

I took this as a message from the Universe, reminding me to be more mindful of my words and my actions towards others.

Today was not a good day.

I was hurting, and in response, I allowed my emotions to direct my words and fuel my actions.

I hurt others today.

I’m sorry to those I hurt today. While I cannot undo the damage that I have done, I am trying to forgive myself and face tomorrow more mindfully.

I can only hope that tomorrow will be a better day.

1 Comment

April 5, 2016

Food for Thought.

I was talking with a friend about an hour ago, regarding an article that someone else had posted concerning how – theoretically – if one were to consider structures in nature as ‘order’ (the natural order of things in a system) then attempts by humans to impose their own concepts or systems of ‘order’ upon natural structures by other means (by sorting, categorizing, or classifying) is therefore a form of ‘disorder,’ because such imposition is creating artificial (unnatural) systems:

Kenneth Udut

April 2 at 10:55pm ·

I ❤ this graphic. Artificial order imposed upon systems *is* chaos because they’re useless to anybody BUT those utilizing the artificial order system.

To the greater system itself? It’s meaningless. Piles? Columns? Sorting by type? That’s all concessions to the limitations of our cognitive systems.

Sure, our cognitive systems are natural too – even the artificial/natural distinction isn’t “quite” right.

But in the greater scheme, the one where humans are optional, those piles and sorting is chaotic and meaningless.

~~~

I’d never thought of order or disorder as being defined this way, and yet, I have been thinking of the relation between the concepts of ‘order’ and ‘disorder’ a lot lately. It began, as most things do, with a simple conversation in a Rokkatru group concerning someone’s UPG of the Aesir representing ‘order’ and ‘civilization’ in the cosmos while the Rokkr represent ‘nature’ and a ‘natural sort of disorder.’ Of course, there was discussion of how nature has its own sense of ‘order’ – but how, from the point of view of ‘civilization,’ nature’s sense of order is random and therefore, considered by civilization to be ‘disorder.’ As well, others discussed the concepts of open and closed systems and how a closed system eventually falls apart because it can’t self-sustain and whatnot, and things quickly became rather meta.

And being a Rokkatru group, of course, this discussion wound its way towards discussion of Ragnarok, and the role of Loki, Fenrir, and Surtr in bringing on the end of the world. The world is a closed system and the role of the Rokkatru is to bring about the destruction of this closed system in order to make way for a new (and perhaps more open) system.

And so, it’s odd but not surprising to me that that conversation gave me a headache…because chaos theory usually does.

~~~

But then, there I was again tonight, having a conversation about order and disorder again, but this time, it was on a smaller scale.

I was talking to my friend about how Loki has laughed at me concerning my OCD need to arrange the items in a specific configuration on His altar, or my habit of overthinking that is a hallmark of my social anxiety, or my inability to let things go and/or trust the process.

I have no problem admitting that I am sort of control freak regarding several aspects of my life and practice. And my friend agreed that she has some of those issues too.

And then, she said a funny-strange but interesting thing that hit me like a ton of bricks:

She said that her life as a child was hellish and the only way that she could have control over her environment was to draw. The only world that she could control could be found at the end of a pencil. So she drew pictures and created stories. She created worlds. She told me how Loki told her that her best artwork seemed to come when she experienced personal turmoil. How He has asked her why she would draw, and she told Him it made her happy. But the truth was that she was often unhappy/angry/miserable while drawing. (And, of course, He noticed that.)

Well, that reminded me of my own artistic coping strategies.

Honestly, I suppose that it’s nothing new, but I wrote and drew my way through a miserable childhood…and adolescence…and fuck, I *still do.*

And yeah, that realization, of how I tried to make sense of confusing experiences by filling up notebooks, and drawing my imaginary friends, and how much it shocks me to think that it wasn’t just me being escapist.

That art was …that art is a rather dysfunctional coping mechanism for me.

I don’t make money with it.

It doesn’t make me happy.

Things still pile up in my head, and writing them, drawing them doesn’t serve to make me any more sane or stable.

And it sure as hell doesn’t help me or my loved ones to understand me any better than before.

It’s just another method I hide behind. (Funny -autocorrect suggests that the word ‘method’ should actually be ‘met God’ over and over. No, I’ve never met God by writing or drawing. Psht. I should be living.)

Perhaps my incessant writing and drawing are what I do to keep myself from meaningfully engaging with others.

who knows.

5 Comments

January 18, 2016

In whatever manner they approach Me…

So I realize that I have not written in a while.

I feel badly about this, despite the reality that I am beholden to no one, and yet, I have been meaning to write something. There is a folder on my laptop that is contains at least a dozen half-finished posts- and several completed ones- and yet I still haven’t posted anything in a while.

I actually finished that post on polyamory.
And there’s a post that I’ve been verbally wrangling with for months concerning cultural beliefs on head-shaving, shame, and adultery, that has had all its references, checked and double-checked…and yet I don’t feel comfortable posting that one, either, because it contains elements that corroborate several personal UPG experiences. I feel both vindicated and terrified by the concepts that have arisen from that.
And devotional tattoos! A lovely 2,258 words on devotional tattoos that was railroaded into a major overhaul re-write by the latest research (as in anthropological research presented as recently as October 2015) on the historical accuracy of the use of woad.
And then there’s Odin. Ah, Odin – the Blood Brother of my Beloved – and the wordless story that comes to me through a stream of beautifully rendered charcoal pencil sketches that I haven’t even drawn yet* – that involve the World Tree, no ordinary man, and a very curious creature who stumbled into apothesis.

*sigh*

~~~

But what I do end up wanting write about is this rather simple concept that my friend Stormwise mentioned to me over six months ago, regarding how the Gods can act as mirrors, and this premise is found in the Bhagavadgita, of all places, Chapter 4, verse 11:

In whatever way people surrender unto me, I reciprocate with them accordingly. Everyone follows my path, knowingly or unknowingly, O son of Pritha.

Another translation:

With whatever motive people worship Me, I fulfill their desires accordingly. People worship Me with different motives. (4.11)

And this little bit of Chapter 4 stands out to me in that this is the very thing that I am trying to accept.

That the Gods will come to you in the manner that you have come to Them. If you approach Them full of fear, then They shall come to you in a manner that inspires fear. Many years ago, I struggled to repress the fear and uncertainty that I felt towards the facets of Them that I felt that I was experiencing.

And Their response -which was often visual at that time – was rather cryptic:

If you are looking for monsters, you will certainly find Us.

It seems such a basic aspect of manifestation that I found myself feeling rather foolish, especially in regards to Odin.

Of course, He was a monster, because I was expecting a monster. If I learned anything, it was that it scarcely concerned Him if I was afraid of Him or disliked Him. He had some business to do, and I had some things to learn.

Well, I learned.

~~~~

* Yes. I can’t get these images out of my head. I feel compelled to draw them out…and yet, my artistic skills aren’t as well-developed as I would hope. At first, I thought the story was a rather simple rendition of the lore…until the storyline took on an unexpected turn that featured some rather adult-themes during several meditations later.

4 Comments

bloodteethandflame

Category: emotional wreck

November 10, 2017

3 AM

April 11, 2017

I believe in pandoramancy, mark 2.

December 29, 2016

Worldbreaker.

November 8, 2016

A thing about…Heather(s)

August 24, 2016

Gold.

July 12, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 11: Separated.

July 11, 2016

I don’t know how.

April 20, 2016

A dark and scary place.

April 5, 2016

Food for Thought.

Kenneth Udut

January 18, 2016

In whatever manner they approach Me…