Introductions

[twistdfateangel]

Who I am: Brenna, also called Twisty

Where I am: Richmond VA, pining for my beloved Loudoun Co.

What I am: A hopeful writer, a hopeless romantic, a shameless redhead (at least, when my summer sunstreaks hit), a knitter, a newlywed, a Liberal, a bookworm, a fangirl (Hufflepuff Pride! Go Badgers!), an amature singer, a roleplayer and an armchair historian, with re-enacting leanings

Why I'm here: I've always been a spiritual oddball, but Christianity always "felt right". Some of the dogma never sat well, but I found what worked and forged my own path the older I got. Last year, I was flipping through a book on Paganism and stumbled upon a brief passage on the idea of Christian Witchcraft. Some people have called it crazy or blasphemy, others want to know why I feel the need to blend the two, and still others tell me not try and to just pick a side and stay there. I wish I could.

In my mind, Witchcraft is a "science", Wicca is a faith. It's like saying I'm an astrophysicist. My eyes are still focused on the skies, but I'm looking for the physics side of things. Also, I see a lot of parallels between the two faiths and that has helped.

What I'm up to: Lately, I've been attracted to animal magic, especially Raven, Lioness, Owl, Bee, Mouse, and Swan, as well as felt the pull of the goddess Hestia, oddly enough, in addition to Salome, Mary Magdalene, the Virgin of Guadalupe, St. Brigid of Kildare, and Eve. I should probably slow down on that, but I can't seem to stop myself. I've been practicing cartomancy for a few years, energy healing for a bit more time, and kitchen magic for a bit less. Also, recently, I've been exploring the concept of magic and divinity as it might tie in with old fairy tales and folklore.

What I'm hoping for: A few revelations, some advice, a miracle or five, and just some good, clever people to chat with.

...I swear, I'm not usually this much of a motormouth--er, hand.

Intro - akatonbo

[akatonbo]

I tend to just describe myself as Unitarian Universalist, as it is both accurate and umbrella, but the long version is sort of Pagan-Buddhist-UU, although since the 'practice' aspect of spiritual practice is an area where I have a lot of room to improve, I'm not sure how much I can count myself as a Buddhist. (Being UU I am way on the 'works' side of the old 'faith vs. works' debate already, but of all the various pieces of my spiritual pie, Buddhism is the one that is, in my book, the most solidly something that one does, not something that one believes.)

I'm in my early 30s and have been at "this" for 20-25 years depending on exactly how you count "this". (I was a teenage witch in the early 1990s, before Buffy and Sabrina, and a would-be magickian in the mid-1980s, which was exactly as successful as you would expect it to be based on the immediately preceding information. I usually count back to junior high, since the shift from childhood games that were half made up from whole cloth to actual spiritual inquiry started about 7th grade, with either Scott Cunningham's crystal book, or possibly a couple of other crystal books that I might have acquired earlier.)

The idea of a Pagan-leaning interfaith community for "spiritual woo-woo" in particular really appeals to me, since that's one aspect of my spiritual life that doesn't get so much attention at church (UUs tend to skew a little skeptical), though I do have other outlets for it.

I was born on the cusp of Aquarius and Pisces, and boy, does it ever show. I'm pretty eclectic as a Pagan -- heavily influenced by Wicca and similar practices, since that's usually what you get in books and public/semi-public groups, but I don't really consider myself Wiccan, it's just a little bit... off. (More on that below.) I don't use the word 'witch' to describe myself much, haven't since college; some of the other words I have used instead by preference are starting to have the same problem now, in that they can mean so many things that you simply cannot count on anyone to understand what you actually mean to say about yourself by them. That'd be another reason why I so often just say I'm UU. As you might guess from the Pagan-Buddhist-UU part, or even just the UU part, I am equally eclectic in the parts of my spiritual life that are not of Pagan/neo-Pagan origin. I'm interested in learning about what other people believe and do whether it's something that speaks to me or not.

(The biggest area of not-quite-right-for-me with Wicca is probably the fact that Wicca proper -- and some but not all of the various things that are often called Wicca but probably shouldn't be -- often has a strong focus on gender polarity (and with it sexuality and fertility), and while those things are obviously an important part of a spiritual path that celebrates the cycles of the seasons and the cycles of life, they're not as central to my happily celibate daily life with my same-gendered partner as they are to so much Wiccan practice.)

Particular areas of long-term interest and/or current investigation include crystal healing, Reiki, the goddess Athena, modern Pagan practice that is well-informed by historical scholarship but is not Reconstructionist (I'm just too darn eclectic), the intersection of mindfulness practice with acceptance and commitment therapy, modern gods in the vein of Roman household gods and other gods of mundane life (I swear I do not only mean 'the baseball gods' but I admit they're in there), progressive Christianity of several flavors, and, well, a lot of things.

(I'd like to think it's already obvious, but I mean no slight to either Wicca, or to any of the things that others might call Wicca that I don't, by making such a distinction. Wicca is just one of several strands of modern neo-Pagan practice that have a number of surface similarities to one another but have some notable differences in belief/practice or history, and which are done a disservice by lumping everything that looks a little bit like a duck under one name.)