When I was young, I was "saved" by a preacher in a Baptist church in Oakwood, Georgia. I was only six; to think that I could begin to understand the gilded web of patriarchal control that was impressing itself upon me at that age was laughable. That is not to say that I didn't possess some insight or intuition into the world beyond this one. Something tugged at me even then because the unpleasant facts of duality had already made themselves present in my life. A union that I was made to believe unbreakable was shattered before eyes that had not yet even seen their tenth birthday. The slow-build volcanic eruption that was my parent's divorce shaped the landscape of my future. At that time it felt like beholding a battlefield where the forces of fear had conquered love. I simply didn't understand how two that loved each other could go on to cause one another such pain and turmoil.
I must wonder now if it was not this prime destruction I was witness to that lead me outside the faith of my family initially and into the book in the library detailing Hinduism. Maybe it was simply the pretty pictures of elephants that bent my imagination as I came to understand them to be the images of gods. There in the book I read about duality, the linked forces of creation and destruction. At many times in my minimal years I had been told I was destructive. I was admonished for constructing a tower only to bring it crashing down moments later. This instinct within me has always been second nature; an intuitive understanding that in order for the next step of the operation to take place, what exists within this moment must be dissolved.
That understanding has matured to an extent. It was naive. I was must too focused on the tearing down and not the building up as a child. This changed with time.
As always, this journal is full of rambles. Let me say what is on my mind at this time plainly instead of waxing philosophical about a past that has already occurred. At thirteen, I encountered Wicca for the first time. I considered myself initiated at that time, though I was without a coven, or any teachers, and had hardly any books to learn from or life experiences to draw upon. What I did have, however, was the intuitive sense that the knowledge I was gaining about this ancient religion was in some way the truth. It was not until now, decades later, with religions, and philosophies, and axioms all researched and catalogued and weighed against one another in my mind. A grand pattern exists between all of them, a double spiral path that leads through and amongst every thought and tradition humanity has ever held. The singularity to this pattern is that which both encompasses, and is herself, all: The Goddess. Though worship is not demanded, and though sovereignty is placed directly with each individual, I still must acknowledge that I believe this truth, The Goddess, is the most high, the most perfected good that all who are pure of heart strive for, the Logos, as humanity would have understood it to now. The earth, the stars, the moon, the sun (but not quite its empowering, emmenating energy), and all the thinks in, on, and around them are the Goddess herself.
The Wiccan rede (An ye harm none, then do as ye will) and the Threefold Law (the true aspect that the "Golden Rule" was based upon) as well as the seven laws of Magick, those are the facts of this world and there are many structures of power that are attempting with all their might and money to deceive me. There are industries abound whos soul purpose is to devise and distribute addicting poison; some of which have already dug their claws into me ... But I have found this path, I found that there is power in fear, I have decided to harness that power instead of letting it be used against me. Ritual, spell, meditation ... these are my weapons against a world that has been constructed to act against the will of the Goddess. Of couse, as a witch, it is not my place to bring harm, ever. But to bind energies? To manifest great things? To chant and sing and dance in forms that no government can begin to imagine putting an end to? That I can do, pal.
I am simply called to love. Bring love and ease to those around me, to those closest to me, and to any whos paths cross mine for any time at all. My enemies are not flesh and blood but are principalities and powers set up by man. In some traditions, the information, the truth, is secreted away, it is "occulted" or made esoteric - that will not be the way for me. I wear the five-pointed star amulet upon my chest with pride, I feel its weight anchoring my steps and actions in perserverance for a cause greater than myself. My fingers and arms and body are animated in ways that have never been before when pondering upon the Goddess. I do not feel shame, I do not feel any of the things I was told I should feel about the human experience I am having. What I do feel is nameless. I stake no claim to gender and I make the bold assumption that I will never act my age. I have full sovereignty over myself. Freedom above all. These things, and many others, are what it means to me to be a Wiccan, to be a witch.
Most importantly of all, I think, this path has brought me peace, purpose, and happiness. That is all I could possibly request and it is mine already. Such is life, So Mote It Be.
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