Finding My Way Back

It makes sense that I coming back to blogging just as the hot months are drawing to a close. Summer is hard for me. While I love certain aspects of it (the sound of the crickets and cicadas outside my window as I drift off to sleep; coming home from a nice long walk covered in sweat and downing water straight from the icebox; ice cream trucks) it is in autumn that I truly come alive. As the year winds to a close I find myself looking forward to new beginnings.

That is what this blog is for me, in a way -- a new beginning. I haven't written regularly in over a year. I had a crisis of faith; a dark night of the soul. I lost touch with those things that had once meant so much to me. I abandoned my regular spiritual practices and washed my hands of the whole deal. I declared myself a non-believer. That wasn't really true. I still believed in Them but I was convinced They no longer believed in me. And my heart broke right in two.

Looking back I think that I ended up trying too hard to make myself fit into a pre-defined package. I had somehow gotten it into my head that it wasn't enough to say, "I identify as a pagan. I have these beliefs. Some I have picked up along the way because they resonated so deeply and some are completely my own. And that is enough." I became convinced that somewhere out there there was a specific religion, a specific pantheon, a specific God/dess that I belonged to and until I found it -- until I named it -- I couldn't be truly fulfilled. I'm not very good with ambiguity sometimes. As much as I abhor seeing others boxed in by labels I don't always allow myself the same freedom. I have spent the last fifteen years of my life researching paganism and neo-paganism. I have followed my bloodline as far back as I can trace it and learned what it was my most ancient ancestors might have believed (assuming that my ancestors even were where I think they were from -- something else I have overthought and worried into the ground.) I thought if I just read enough -- if I just learned enough -- it would all fall into place and the light bulb would go off. "A-ha," I would think, "here is where I belong! This is what I was looking for. This is what I should be doing!" But, you know, that never happened.

So I let it all go. I was making myself more and more confused with every book I read, every prayer I said, every candle I lit. What had seemed so simple at one time had become horrendously complicated and the answers I begged for just wouldn't come. I thought that maybe I would be better off just calling myself an agnostic with mystical leanings and have done with it. Or maybe, I thought, I should just abandon belief altogether and go about the business of living in the "real world."

But it didn't work. I believe what I believe not because I want to but because I have been shown that it is true. And eventually I realized that I would be betraying Those who revealed these things to me by turning my back on that truth. No matter how complicated it might feel I had to find my way back to honoring Those who never turned Their backs on me even though I had turned my back on Them.

So I put the books away for a while. I stepped away from the internet and the communities and the mailing lists and the bookmarks and the mythology and I went back to what I used to do before I knew that what I felt had any name at all. I went for long walks outside. I sat in front of a candle and let whatever might come flow through me without trying to pin it down. I kissed my hand to the new Moon when I caught sight of Her without demanding to know Her name. I let the Sun fall on my face in the morning and gave thanks to Him for all of His gifts. I sat with the shadows and prayed to my Grandmothers and Grandfathers. I listened with patience to what they had to say and when they said nothing at all I simply thanked them for the blood running through my veins. And eventually I found my way back to a spiritual place that was even stronger and brighter than it had been before.

Because before I had struggled with the concept of deities that I could not see. What I realized when I was quiet enought to allow it to penetrate was that I could see them everywhere. My earth goddess is the Earth herself. She is every tree, every blade of grass, every firm path under my feet. The Moon was right there in the sky above me, the Sun around every corner. I realize now that this is enough. It is so much more than enough. 

I cannot guarantee that I will never have another crisis of faith again. But if I remember to stop and see and not overthink every little thing I think I'll be OK. Because I know that They are there even when it feels that They are not and that is I who creates the distance between us, not Them.