Hi! Welcome to my blog. This is where I’ll be recording some things for my grimoire as well as where I’ll be posting my experiences as a witch!

Please call me Lady Giovanni! Or Lady for short. You can also call me Vanni. I’m 17 and bisexual genderfluid (I mostly shift between femme and enby though)

I am a broom closeted eclectic chaos witch who dabbles in divination and energy work. I use tarot cards and my pendulum as well as do a bit of astrology work as my main divination methods. I don’t do a lot of spellwork unless it’s the necessities like protective charms or warding. I also most notably have a crystal addiction; not something to be happy about but hey, shiny.

I also do deitywork! I work with a pretty large number of deities, but nowadays I’ve been focusing my worship on Apollo (I asked my other deities and guides for their consent on the matter and they said it was okay since I like, desperately need to heal from some traumatic shit)

The deities and guides I work with are:

• Apollo
• Loki
• Dionysus
• Eros
• Hermes
• Ares
• Hypnos
• Zeus
• Freyja
• Psyche
• Aphrodite
• Lucifer
• Asmodeus
• Lifa (my spirit animal/ animal guide)

I know, I work with a lot of guides. Not like I mind much though.

I’ve been a hellenic polytheist since 10th grade and Asatrui since about 8th grade but has dabbled in demonolatry a bit earlier on (Lucifer can vouch for that with my numerous attempts at summoning him at like, age 10)

So like, yeah. Follow me if you want to hear about the countless shenanigans that is my spiritual journey.

Today’s Hellenic Polytheism Prompt

Do you celebrate Noumenia each month? If so, what do you do for it?

- Submitted by @mythical-manda

Today, from an idea given by the amazing @adri-le-chat, we’ll be talking about the temple duties of a priest. While ancient Greek priesthood spans many topics and duties, those explicitly relating to the temple in which the priest served can sometimes be left to the wayside by studies of in favor of sacrifices and the like.

In ancient Greece, temples and priests went hand in hand. When a city wanted to install a new temple to honor a certain god or a new epithet of the same god, they also “installed” priests to serve in those temples. So, let’s look more into that relationship!

In addition to performing regular sacrifices/offerings in the temple on behalf of the city in which they served, priests would also be tasked with looking after the temple and its contents. Priestesses in particular were kleidouchos or key-holders, bearing the (mostly decorative) key to their temple. If you want to know more about that, here is the post in which I talked about it more in detail.

Priests would also perform administrative duties in the beginning, although later on that moved into the domain of a magistrate:

As “sacristans for the gods”, the priests in the beginning also administered temple property. In later legislation the administration of larger sanctuaries was entrusted to state functionaries" (pg. 37 of Priesthood)

Additionally, priests would appeal to the leader of their city for funding for their temple or other sacred expenses (mentioned often as sacred revenues, belonging to the god which they served).

The role of a priest also had overlap with that of a custodian in some ways, as priests were expected to clean and care for their temple as well, including the statue of its god:

[Part of a priest’s original functions were] taking good care of the statue which represented the god and in which [the god] was thought to reside. It had to be washed, clothed, and protected. (pg. 37 of Priesthood)

Not only did priests care for the statue within their temple, they also worked on the temple in which they resided, caring for the altar, the space of the temple itself, and the ritual items and objects within.

Overall, along with their regular sacrificial duties. Priests cared for not only the statue of their temple, but the temple itself, advocating for their budgeting, guarding the temple and keeping the temple key, and taking care of the ritual elements within.

If you wish to learn about a specific aspect of priesthood, feel free to send in an ask!

Sources:Priesthood by Leopold Sabourin, On Greek Religion by Robert Parker, and Understanding Greek Religion by Jennifer Larson.

Well, here goes nothing. I’m going to start the 15 days of deity devotion post series for Zeus. I don’t think I’ll post every single day for this series, but I’ll try to make it at least regular.

Day 1 - Basic Introduction

Name:Zeus.

Domain: Weather, justice, family, household, cities, law and order, the heavens, fatherhood, leadership, purification, fate, xenia, protection, etc.

Symbols: Eagle, bull, swan, thunderbolt, oak tree, crown, throne, stormcloud, mountains, etc.

Epithets: I’m not going to list all of them, but here are a few of my favorites! - Zeus Apemios (Averter of Ills) - Zeus Hykesios (of Suppliants) - Zeus Hypatos (Nost High) - Zeus Kataibates (Who Comes Down) - Zeus Kathersios (of Ritual Purification) - Zeus Ktesios (of the Household and Property) - Zeus Meilikhios (the Merciful) - Zeus Palamnios (Punisher of Murderers) - Zeus Phyxios (of Refuge) - Zeus Polieus (of the City) - Zeus Soter (of Safety, Preservation, and Deliverance from Harm) - Zeus Teleios (of Marriage Rites) - Zeus Xenios (of Hospitality)

If you’re curious about any of these epithets and want to learn more, I have posts for a few of them on my page!

Devotional Acts: I actually made a previous post on devotional acts for him, which I’ll put here.

Offerings: Representations of any of his sacred animals, trees, or symbols, water, tea, coffee (in my experience he prefers coffee with milk but no sugar /upg), frankincense, myrrh, rain-scented, or storax incense, (if old enough to buy alcohol) whiskey, gin, vodka (any hard liquor will do), cakes, breads (if offering to Zeus Hypatos, only cake, and if offering to Zeus Meilikhios, cakes baked in the shapes of animals like pigs or goats), meat, etc.

Why people hating on Zeus equals to hating on a whole ancient society and… it’s kinda dumb

If you have been in the part of social media that discusses ancient religions or ancient mythology you might know Zeus is hated badly. If you worship Zeus like I do I’m pretty sure you are aware of how many people actually waste times of their live doing bad jokes of how every woman on ancient Greece was pregnant with Zeus’s kid or another type of bullshit, and I’m tired of that. There are already like 100 posts on other Zeus worshippers giving their take on this topic but you know what? I want to be the 101 so here I am. I’f you hate Zeus I ask you nicely to grab your coffee, water, tea, whatever, sit and read this post.

this post is written with a target audience of people who do not have much knowledge aside from the myths and what social media say, I’ll be including the very basic theological and cultural aspects of Ancient Greece in this post so let’s consider this a baby course into epithets and the human kind changing their ethic code through time. 

Before we officially start I’m sure some Zeus haters already have arguments to throw at me as soon as they finish reading this post so let me tell you, as a MUN delegate who’s obsessed with debate, some argument starters I won’t even read if you start a sentence with them:

“I believe or I think” I’m sorry but I don’t care about your personal biases I want facts.

“X media thing portrays” x media or x author is not a reliable source of information, unless it’s a historian with good background resources or reliable sources I won’t even take it in mind

“In other religions…” this is hellenism not other religions

“But in x myth” myths are not literal

“But x deity” all deities are different

Anyways, let’s start with what’s a myth, the merriam webster dictionary says a myth is  “a usually traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural”. My religion teacher back on catholic school also added to this definition a “moral code or cultural reflection religions implied into their followers”, and it’s accurate.

In baby words, myths explain things our society can’t explain while also reflecting our culture and behaviours.

Clear? Clear. 

History has shown us that many religions don’t take their myths completely literally, most times they take them as metaphors or teachings to follow or simply they use them as propaganda to increase certains individual power, and this includes Ancient Greeks. If a king wanted to increase his power to scare people that may want to rebel he could easily say he was the child of Zeus, which is an explanation to why so many kings and heroes were kids of the all-mighty deity. Ancient Greeks also had to find a way to explain different phenomenons, and as many cultures before and after them, myths were a perfect way of doing so. To finish with myths and their uses, as many religions did and still do, the ancient Greeks needed a way to spread lessons to their people without the need of sitting them down and literally teaching them. Instead of doing this they preferred giving examples of things not to do. What makes Hellenism so different to actual modern religions is that the practice was and is more important that the actually texts, that can be a base but at the end of the day they are not the structure of the religion.

Now, a huge mistake many people commit is thinking the myths we nowadays read are the original myths. That’s a mistake. Ingrid Holmberg says in her essay titled as The Creation of the Ancient Greek Epic Cycle  “Their research (addressing Milman Parry and Albert Lord.) and the research of their followers has revealed that the Greek epic oral tradition formed a huge, interconnected, and variegated web of legendary and mythical narratives that comprised the corpus of the epic cycle(…).” Harvard university also addresses this topic by saying “Basically, the “question” came down to this: were the Homeric poems composed with or without the aid of writing? Parry’s project, the comparing of Homeric poetry with the living oral traditions of South Slavic heroic poetry, led him to conclude that the Homeric texts were indeed the products of oral composition.”

So tell me, years of investigation affirms that the myths were told from mouth to mouth, the poets did not write their original work down but after many years later someone did… the version written is a version passed generation from generation by someone who heard them from their parents who heard them from their grandparents that might have edited and changed the original version for hundreds of years. Knowing all this areyou’re still going to judge a culture and a religion through myths? Really? Because that’s plainly dumb.

Let me give you an example, I write you a message and then pass it through google translator 20 times, and send it. And actually did! The message I’ll translate 20 times is “Hello dear readers of the internet, this is an experiment with google translator to explain how dumb is to literally judge a myth that has been changed hundreds of times. Not only that, a myth that reflected a society with different a ethic code, in some hundreds of years if society still exists they are going to judge some things we do… so em don’t waste your time on that”. After passing that message through 20 different languages in google translator this is how it ended up: Hello, dear internet reader, you will be judged not only by this, but also by some of the hundreds of years that we have done with the growth of social networks … so don’t waste time. Don’t waste.

I’m not trying to say that historians and their translations are as bad as google translator, I know this people have studied years to do what they do, I’m just saying that the original stories were told so many times that we have hundreds of adaptations and changes. Here’s an example, if you read a copy of the iliad written by x guy and then grab another copy written by another guy… you’ll find many differences in the translation.

Now that we got the translation clear thing you’ll probably still say “yeah anyways still myths say Zeus is a pr3d4tor who cheated on his wife muuultiple times”. And to that I’ll laugh ten minutes because yeah but no. Look at my beautiful hazel and eyes and tell me, do you think Ancient Greek men cared about women? And how they were treated? and how they were portrayed in the moment of explaining things?

If you say yes I beg you to go study some history. 

If you say no, bingo. 

A year a go I went down the rabbit whole of homosexuality in the ancient world, wrote an essay on it, and I found out men repeled women and they saw them as baby machines (i mean, some still do) so some societies had this idea that the closest relationship to love you could have with someone was with another man. So, understand that the ancient world didn’t give a damn about women. Most myths shows them as trophies, that’s no surprise for anyone at this point. So of course, they saw women as baby machines and as myths are reflections of society, do you really expect the Ancient Greeks to portray them as something else aside baby creators? Nooo!!!! Ofc they were not going to do that, they needed mothers to give an explanation to the hundreds of kings saying they were Zeus’s kids, and they found them.

Okay now, some of you may ask why did he “cheat” on Hera… more cultural aspects being reflected. Here’s what Jennifer Larson the writer of Ancient Greek cults has to say:

Now that we closed the marriage ethic issue The Zeus has many child joke or insult is even dumber because kids were so important for the social status in that era that they stablished the social status. During all Human’s story, money establishes your place in the social status: the more you have the higher you are. This also applied in the Ancient Greece. By having more kids it meant you had more to offer and to sustain your family, basically more kids = more money = more power = higher rank. 

Studying children and childhood is of great importance because it provides insight into social norms and social life in ancient Greece. Children were important for the parents, the home, and city. Not having children led to inability to pass on the property and wealth of the father.

If Zeus, the KING of the gods and mortals, father of humanity, doesn't have a lot of children then what do you think it would do to how Ancient Greeks perceived him huh. If they measured by kids ofc their higher deity had to have a lot because that gave him power, please, it’s pure logic. The fact that he has multiple kids is a perfect reflection of how the Ancient Greece society acted, do you really want to sit down and complain about it? Why don’t you instead start thinking of a way of changing that capitalist mindset that still rules our society instead of bullying an old civilization and their cults.

—End of the cultural rant—

Okay cultural part has finished, let’s dive into my favorite topic ever: epithets. And I actually did like 3 polls on this, both on my twitter and my instagram, asking if my followers knew what an epithet was. I always had this thought that one of the reasons many people hate on deities is because they only see one side of their multiple-side self… and ofc the answer was no, they did not:

And epithets are soooo important to understand a deity, So assuming some people might not know what epithets are here is a brief summary extracted from a previous post of mine addressing epithets and their importance: Literal definition of epithet: an adjective or phrase expressing a quality or attribute regarded as characteristic of the person or thing mentioned.Let me give you an example: A friend of yours loves reading, they love it so freaking much, so one of your teachers is like “oh pepito the reader”, it’s obvious that pepito is a reader.Now examples with deities. Demeter Chthonia (of the Earth). WHAT DO WE ASSUME KIDS?! That Demeter is an Earth deity. Duh. And like that with all the deities. 

Epithets basically tell us how deities were perceived when worshipped, and many of the people who love judging Zeus have ignoring epithets as their favorite hobby so here I am, giving you a list of my favorite ones to take in mind: 

AGO′NIUS (Agônios), a surname or epithet of several gods. Aeschylus (Agam. 513) and Sophocles (Trach. 26) use it of Apollo and Zeus, and apparently in the sense of helpers in struggles and contests.

AGORAEUS and AGORAEA (Agoraia and Agoraios), are epithets given to several divinities who were considered as the protectors of the assemblies of the people in the agora, such as Zeus 

ALASTOR (Alastôr). an epithet of Zeus, describing him as the avenger of evil deeds. 

EVA′NEMUS (Euanemos), the giver of favourable wind

HETAEREIUS (Hetaireios), the protector of companies or associations of friends

HY′PATUS (Hupatos), the most high

LECHEA′TES (Lecheatês) i.e. the protector of childbed

NOMOS (Nomos), a personification of law, described as the ruler of gods and men. 

PANHELLE′NIUS (Panellênios), i.e. the god common to, or worshipped by all the Hellenes or Greeks

PHY′XIUS (Phuzios), i. e., the god who protects fugitives

POLIEUS (Polieus), “the protector of the city;”

SOTER (Sôtêr), i. e. “the Saviour”

Theos Agathos - The Good God

MEILIKHIOS (Milichius) Gracious, Merciful

After reading all this epithets I want to ask one last time, do you still think Zeus is a jerk? When he has the literal epithet of being a Good God? A merciful one? A protector? THE PERSONIFICATION OF LAW?

A fact aspect I want to mention is how people love to completely erase the good sides of Zeus portrayed in many myths. In the Iliad Zeus loves one of his most loved sons, he wants to go and revenge him because he’s an amazing dad but he knows that if he does that he would be impartial and injustice to the other deities who have lost children but haven’t been able to do anything about it. Instead he mourns in silence just to refrain from making other deities feel less privileged, this happens in the freaking Iliad and I’m sorry but I think that is a perfect example of how good Zeus is even if myths are not literal.

IZeus is more than the character modern media converted him into, he’s way more than that. He’s a deity, with multiple aspects and multiple stories that have adapted to fit into into ancient societies idea of what was a higher deity. All the arguments people have against him show that they do not understand how myths work and they do not understand that ancient times came with ancient ideals.

So please, research and form your own criteria before hating on something you don’t actually know about. Give yourself the opportunity to listen all sides of the story and then after that you can say whatever you want. Most importantly, give yourself the opportunity to learn.

Hopefully this is my last post regarding this matter, if I quite changed your mind in any type of way then that’s great, if I didn’t that’s on you. That’s all I have to say and thank you for reading the post complete!

The Harvard post I quote at the beginning of the article is this one, if you have time please check it out : https://chs.harvard.edu/curated-article/gregory-nagy-orality-and-literacy/

aynrandslashfiction:

“Dionysus is a god who takes human form, a powerful male who looks soft and feminine, a native of Thebes who dresses as a foreigner. His parentage is mixed between divine and human; he is and is not a citizen of Thebes; his power has both feminine and masculine aspects. He does not merely cross boundaries, he blurs and confounds them, makes nonsense of the lines between Greek and foreign, between female and male, between powerful and weak, between savage and civilized. He is the god of both tragedy and comedy, and in his presence the distinction between them falls away, as both comedy and tragedy…”

—

Paul Woodruff, 

The Bacchae (Translated and Annotated) - Euripides

(viacontradictionaddiction)

unofficeleriac-deactivated20210:

Reblog if it’s okay for anybody to message you if they’re feeling lonely during self isolation. Let’s get through this together!

heatherwitch:

Small devotional acts.

• Keep a tealight on you, light it wherever you may be
  
• Clean one small area of your house
• Savor a hot drink
• Do small, unnoticed acts of kindness
• Always greet animals, both big and small
• Do anything by candlelight 
• Get cozy and read a good book 
• Wear colors you associate with her
• Practice your patience, both external and internal
• Be a listening ear or shoulder to cry on for those who need it
• Make compromises when it is healthiest for both parties
• Bake!
• Become the one who always has a lighter or matches
• Listen to music that reminds you of her
• Spend time tending to your body
• Leave a big tip the next time you have a chance
• Practice kindness in all areas of your life - including driving
• Host/organize a gathering of friends or family
• Take a hot bath or shower with no time limit
• Decorate a space
• Leave the first bite of your food for her
• Build a fire!
• Veiling (can come in many, discreet forms)
• Compliment people - both strangers and loved ones
• Donate something, be it clothes, money, or your time 
• Create something - I really like knitting!
• Look at photos and embrace the happy nostalgia 
• Wear makeup or jewelry that reminds you of her
• Wake up early to see the sunrise - or watch the sunset
• Watch/read about acts of kindess - be inspired!
• PRACTICE LOVING YOURSELF
• Many, many, many other things not said here
• Additionally,this post is great!

Daimones Part 2: Children of Nyx

In Greek mythology, there are various personified spirits called daimones. Eventually this word evolved into what we now know as “demon” (a word with negative connotations), but daimones weren’t necessarily “evil” spirits. Most of these daimones are the children of Nyx, Eris, or Zeus. In general, the daimon children of Zeus are personifications of morally good concepts, while the children of Nyx and Eris represent the malevolent forces which plague humans. Some daimones (like Hebe, the goddess of youth, or even Eris herself) were full fledged gods, while others were mere personifications with no mythology or cult.

According to Hesiod

• Moros:the personification of doom (the force which drive humans toward inevitable death). Prometheus saved mankind from misery by taking away the foresight of our own doom (Moros) and replacing it with Elpis (hope).
• Keres:female spirits of violent or cruel death. One of the Keres, Akhlys, was the goddess of deadly poisons and the death-mist which clouds the eyes of mortals before death.
• Hypnos:god of sleep, husband of Pasithea (relaxation)
• Thanatos:god of peaceful or non-violent death. As the twin brother of Hypnos, he represented the eternal slumber of death.
• Oneroi:spirits of dreams, they were sometimes considered the children of Hypnos rather than Nyx. Their leader was said to be Morpheus, a man who appeared in the dreams of kings bringing messages from the gods.
• Nemesis:goddess of righteous indignation and deserved retribution against those with too much good fortune. She represented the balance of good and bad fortune.
• Hesperides:spirits of the evening sunset. They were sometimes called the daughters of Atlas.
• Momos:mockery, blame, complaint, and harsh criticism. Zeus expelled him from heaven for criticizing the gods.
• Oizys:female spirit of misery, woe, distress, and suffering
• Apate:female spirit of deceit, guile, and fraud
• Philotes:friendship and affection. She may have also been the spirit of sexual intercourse.
• Geras:male spirit of old age
• Eris:goddess of strife. She is the mother of a host of malevolent spirits of war.
• Moirai: the fates were sometimes called daughters of Nyx, although more often they were the daughters of Zeus and Themis.

Likely Children of Nyx

• Anaideia:ruthlessness and unforgiveness
• Adikia:injustice and wrong-doing
• Adephegia:gluttony
• Aergia:idleness, laziness, and sloth
• Alastor:counterpart of the Erinyes who punished the family of murderers
• Aporia:powerlessness
• Lyssa:mad rage, fury, rabies
• Epiales:nightmares
• Dolos:trickery, cunning deception, and craftiness
• Koalemos:stupidity and foolishness
• Kakia: vice and immorality
• Epiphron:prudence, shrewdness, and careful consideration
• Phyge:flight, escape, retreat, and exile
• Phrice:horror, she is a more severe counterpart of DeimosandPhobos.
• Phthisis:wasting away, perishing, and decay
• Hubris:insolence, violence, reckless pride, arrogance, and outrage. Her son, Koros, represented insolence and disdain
• Dyssebia:impiety, sometimes called the mother of Hubris.
• Amekhania:helplessness and want, sister of PeniaandPtokheia
• Ptokheia:beggary, sister of AmekhaniaandPenia
• Penia:poverty and need, sister of AmekhaniaandPtokheia
• Eleos: mercy, pity, compassion
• Sophia:wisdom
• Elpis:hope. She was the last spirit that remained in Pandora’s box, representing humanity’s hold on hope in the face of all of these terrors. Her daughter, Pheme, was the personification of rumor, report, and gossip.
• Sophrosyne:moderation, self-control, temperance, and restraint
• Phthonos:jealousy and envy, especially in the context of love
• Nosoi:male spirits of plague, sickness, and disease
• Maniai:spirits of madness, insanity, and crazed frenzy
• Arai:female spirits of curses (this is where I got my URL)
• Poinai:spirits of vengeance and punishment

Favorite myth or myths of this deity

With the exception of her birth, Hestia is featured in two prominent myths. The first is the myth of her refusing to marry either Poseidon or Apollon and instead asking Zeus for the honor of tending the hearth. The second is the myth of her attempted rape by Priapos, in which a nearby donkey saves her by waking her up with its bray–allowing Hestia to escape.

My favorite is the story of her and her siblings’ births to Kronos and Rheia because it became the basis for the “first and last rule.” Basically, Hestia was the first born child of Kronos and Rheia, and she subsequently became the first to be swallowed by Kronos. After Zeus gave Kronos the mixture of mustard and wine and he began to vomit up his children, Hestia was the last to be disgorged. This gave Hestia the distinction of being the first and last born child of Kronos and Rheia, and is why the ancients offered to her first and last in every ritual.

I guess I should also mention the fake abdication myth. Basically, the ancients didn’t even “agree” on who the twelve Olympians were. In Athens, the altar in the agora depicted Hestia as the twelfth while the east frieze on the Parthenon showed Dionysos. There was never a concrete list of Olympians, nor was there an abdication myth in ancient times.

So as I’ve moved more into reconstructionist Ancient Greek religion and devoted my time to more religious study rather than occultism and Ancient Greek magic, I’ve compiled quite the collection of literature. As I continue down this path, I was wondering if anyone would be interested in me compiling a syllabus of sorts for general learning about Ancient Greek (specifically Athenian) religion? So rather than just a recommended reading list, I’d attempt to provide a structure and commentary on the books. It’d start with historical sources and move into academia divided into different sections based on their subject matter, and then ultimately conclude with criticisms/expansions of the academic and literary canon from anti-racist, decolonial, and feminist perspectives. Let me know if this is something y’all would be interested in rather than just a general recommended reading list on Ancient Greek religion!

The Rite of Her Sacred Fires 2021

My Thargelia celebrations

i. Dionysos

beloved, lascivious God. He whose breath is like kindling and skin is of silk, veneral Dionysos

“Khthonion Dionysos, hear my prayer, rise vigilant with Nymphai of lovely hair : great Bakkhos Amphietos, annual God, who laid asleep in Persephone’s abode, her sacred seat, didst lull to drowsy rest the rites triennial and the sacred feast; which roused again by thee, in graceful ring, thy nurses round thee mystic anthems sing; when briskly dancing with rejoicing powers, thou movest in concert with the circling hours. Come blessed, fruitful, horned, and divine, and on this sacred consecration propitious shine; accept the pious incense and the prayer, and make prolific the holy fruits thy care.”

— Orphic Hymn 53 to Amphietus

A guide to worship of Charites - cheat sheets

Hellenic cheat sheets

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A guide to worship of Amphitrite - cheat sheets

Hellenic cheat sheets

If you like my content consider supporting me on:https://ko-fi.com/screeching0wlet

A guide to worship of Priapus - cheat sheets

Hellenic cheat sheets

If you like my content consider supporting me on:https://ko-fi.com/screeching0wlet

I took Dread P//rs//ph//n// seriously. I am scare

The closest thing I could get to depicting Aphrodite. Not 100% accurate. Maybe 97%.

Oh and

…. Her. Aidoneus’ Bride. Scary lady. Minus the white stuff on the veil.

Starting a new writing project regarding hellenism and my practice. once i get a decent way into it, im considering putting them out for people to see. got two options:

publish them on this blog just as a regularly scheduled post series

record them and post them on a hellenism YouTube channel (just in the vein of video essays or audio podcast stuff)

if you have an opinion on it, let me know. like, reblog, message, tag, whatever you want to let me know what you think i should do. or if you think i should keep it to myself, go ahead and say that

cheers

-D

when i die

burn my body to ash

so that my spirit is freed

a plain terra cotta amphora

to hold whats left if me

put two coins in the ash

the highest value you can find

and bury my on a hillside

with a birch planted, reaching for the sky

and when you think of me

find an asphodel flower

so when you pick one for you

you can think of where i will wander

at peace and knowing

you’re doing okay

and on the Fields of Hades

we might meet one day

Hermes 

Swift-Footed and Luck Maker

I offer these things, my time and my car

Let the tires that roll on the ground 

Be a set of spinning prayer wheels 

Gathering energy going round and round

Take the steering wheel concerts

And speakers blasting loud

Cleanse the space with joyous, raucous sound

Every tank of gas, ever oil change

Every swipe of the wiper bladesIs a libation to you, dedicated to your name

My signals and distraction free time

Is a gift to you of mine

To remind me of the safety you invite

Every mile I drive, every trip to and from home

Is dedicated time to the god of the road

Take this prayer and dedication earnest and true

For it is you Hermes, that I give it to

“good practice” isn’t just formal rituals and tons of offerings

“good practice” isn’t observing every holiday with a feast and celebration with a large party and hundreds of dollars in decor

“good practice” isn’t praying every day.

it can be laying on your bed or couch with your headphones in listening to a playlist or audiobook.

it can be cooking or baking something

it can be lighting a candle to clear up that weird smell in your room but also because the candle scent reminds you of something

it can be wearing a necklace or ring everyday without any second thought to it except when you need to shower

it can be picking up every piece of change off the ground because it feels like finding a little treasure

it can be vibing in a dark room lit only by some candles and doing nothing for five minutes

it can be working on that project you needed to get done anyway

it can be picking up that instrument you barely touch anymore because you feel like playing a couple songs before putting it back again

it can be watching that one channel on YouTube that gives you some good vibes

it can be hanging that pendant off your rear view mirror

it can be anything. The gods aren’t limited to your altar. The gods aren‘t neglected just because your offering plate gets dusty. The gods aren’t demanding.

the gods are everywhere and in everything in your life. It’s taking the time to recognize them and remind yourself of them every day.

”good practice“ is whatever you’re able to do

☀TAROT SERVICES☀

(descriptions will be below)

☀Crossroads Reading - $15

☀Shadow Reading - $20

☀Torchbearer Reading - $25

☀General Reading- $5 per card.

☀CROSSROADS READING☀

Are you looking to make a decision soon, but unsure of which option to take? This is the reading for you. It looks at potential outcomes for multiple decisions, bringing you clarity and insight on which option is best for you.

☀SHADOW READING☀

Are you wanting to dive deeper into shadow work, but unsure where to start? This reading is a comprehensive look into how your shadow self is affecting your physical, emotional, and spiritual life, as well as looking into how it affects your relationships.

☀TORCHBEARER READING☀

Are you struggling interpreting signs? This one is intended for people seeking counsel with their deities. You can have it done for insight from a specific deity, but it also can be used to help identify if any deities are reaching out to you!

All readings will be in typed Google Doc format in which I will send you a link when it is finished. Turnaround for readings is 7 days maximum (most will be finished before that point.) All payments will be done via Venmo or PayPal. (If you send through Venmo it HAS to be done as a private payment.)

I am opened readings up because I am having a difficult time finding a job. I recently escaped an abusive situation, so if you are wanting to help a nonbinary autistic lesbian not have to go back to that, please consider a reading with me! I have been reading tarot for 5 years now and love offering in depth insight to people who want it.

Venmo: @/magicofthemuse

paypal.me/magicofthemuse

Remember, even the smallest altar tucked in a corner hidden from view will still make the Gods happy and gives you a place to worship them.

And if you can’t have a physical altar, one drawn in a journal or saved on a computer is just as good. Hell, an imaginary altar that you have in your head is good enough! They understand, and see you trying, and are happy with you.