Erik Amundsen's Blog, page 81
January 3, 2011
Why do I Always Think that Arisia is in March?
It's the middle of this month.
*headdesk*
*headdesk*
January 2, 2011
The Grimoire Day 13
Laziness reigns today after the quest for the $14 TV concluded yesterday in success. Unfortunately, mental exhaustion from last week and trying to wash away same with ethanol on New Year's Eve seems to have left me, while not hung over, certainly dulled in both sharpness and brightness. There is no magical way I know around the need for rest when you have burned out.
Day 13
Be mindful of your limits. My culture is not; again, like the situation with solitary, transitory meals, almost seems designed to disrespect human capacity. There is nothing wrong with trying to expand your capacity, when you can, but we seem, in my culture, to view exhaustion and toil as moral good. It is not.
I know many ways to draw upon energy, many energies on which to draw, and I suspect you will figure out, as you try, which ones are comfortable to use (I like sunlight and wind and the ground beneath my feet. I also have really good natural capacities for dealing with disruptive, fractious and negatively-experienced energies [a fact that gets me into a lot of trouble]. I like flowing water, too.) When you eat, you may turn your thoughts toward what you have eaten and write your intentions on what you choose to do with the energy that food gives you. I like that trick a lot, perhaps a little too much, as I am a raging hypnophobe who had to take up running to deal with over 15 years of eating for energy-to-make-up-for-lack-of-sleep. Also, if you have chronic digestive troubles, I am not certain this won't aggravate them - I'm sure there is a means by which you can adapt that technique to easing digestion, but I have never had to, so my thoughts on the matter are entirely speculative.
Anyway, we witches love to talk about energy and energies and we worker bees in our sundry hives love to talk about our energy levels, but one thing I don't hear very often, and only picked up on my own and shockingly late is that energy is not the whole story of how and what and how much we can do. There is also the structure that carries the energy, whether this is your physical meat or the pathways that people imagine running through said physical meat, along which energy is meant to travel.
Those fatigue. And more energy is no more the solution to structural fatigue than more water is the solution to crapped out plumbing.
I am rambling. Here's what's to do about structural fatigue: sometimes it is enough to simply rest. Most of the time it is, it's just a matter of time and figuring out levels of restfulness (ranging from sleep and building gradually in activity levels and then backing them off when you start hitting real resistance seems to work, but I cannot know for you what real resistance and what levels of activity are going to work - do what you can and taper off when it gets to be work). But, again, if you are a part of my culture, whether or not it is yours, that time is rarely available and our culture offers no notion of strategies to make what we have useful (thus we always return to work from leave more exhausted than we left). So there is a thing that can help make the whole thing a little more - as much as it seems like heresy, or, at least as profoundly wrongheaded as offering tips on how to choose the safest crystal meth or black tar heroin out there (neither of which I have actually tried, so don't ask me) - efficient
This one is just a matter of visualization, and, in a way, a matter of throwing energy at a problem that energy doesn't fix. Doesn't fix on its own, anyway, this is a matter of intention. Framing things as a visualization is a weird way for me to do it, since I am far more tactile than I am visual, but what the hell.
You want to start by grounding, but, if you're the sort who starts throwing open the channels when you ground and picturing energy flowing through you, you may want to try and hold back a little. This is more passive. For me, it is like waves coming in on low tide. Let energy in, but don't make it flow quickly or hot or bright or whatever you would do to raise up a good head of steam. Keep it dark and cool and slow.
Follow the energy and feel where it goes. Or see where it goes. Or listen for the echoes (actually, that sounds kind of cool. I ought to try that). Get a sense of those pathways, and let your energies move through them passively. Relax your body for this one.
Once you've got it, make your intention to fill the cracks, fix the pipes, straighten what is bent. Let this go for a while. If you nap, that's pretty cool, and if you nap as a habit, this is a good meditation to get used to doing when you go for a nap. I always feel funny when I try it for a night's sleep - any meditative state when I am sleeping tends to extend my consciousness into stages of sleep for which you really don't want to be conscious, because sleep paralysis is scary when you're consciously aware of it, but that may just be my own brain damage.
Try to go for about half an hour or 45 minutes. After that, slowly, over the next couple of hours, increase the flow of energy (this will happen naturally if you engage in any normal activity - just ease into it a little). The whole cycle will take you about 3 hours minimum to get back to a semblance of full capacity, if you really need to get there. Otherwise, keep yourself on light duty (not total rest, or you're likely to get restless) for the rest of the day. Take a walk that ends about an hour before you go to bed.
That's what I've got today. Off to take my own advice.
Day 13
Be mindful of your limits. My culture is not; again, like the situation with solitary, transitory meals, almost seems designed to disrespect human capacity. There is nothing wrong with trying to expand your capacity, when you can, but we seem, in my culture, to view exhaustion and toil as moral good. It is not.
I know many ways to draw upon energy, many energies on which to draw, and I suspect you will figure out, as you try, which ones are comfortable to use (I like sunlight and wind and the ground beneath my feet. I also have really good natural capacities for dealing with disruptive, fractious and negatively-experienced energies [a fact that gets me into a lot of trouble]. I like flowing water, too.) When you eat, you may turn your thoughts toward what you have eaten and write your intentions on what you choose to do with the energy that food gives you. I like that trick a lot, perhaps a little too much, as I am a raging hypnophobe who had to take up running to deal with over 15 years of eating for energy-to-make-up-for-lack-of-sleep. Also, if you have chronic digestive troubles, I am not certain this won't aggravate them - I'm sure there is a means by which you can adapt that technique to easing digestion, but I have never had to, so my thoughts on the matter are entirely speculative.
Anyway, we witches love to talk about energy and energies and we worker bees in our sundry hives love to talk about our energy levels, but one thing I don't hear very often, and only picked up on my own and shockingly late is that energy is not the whole story of how and what and how much we can do. There is also the structure that carries the energy, whether this is your physical meat or the pathways that people imagine running through said physical meat, along which energy is meant to travel.
Those fatigue. And more energy is no more the solution to structural fatigue than more water is the solution to crapped out plumbing.
I am rambling. Here's what's to do about structural fatigue: sometimes it is enough to simply rest. Most of the time it is, it's just a matter of time and figuring out levels of restfulness (ranging from sleep and building gradually in activity levels and then backing them off when you start hitting real resistance seems to work, but I cannot know for you what real resistance and what levels of activity are going to work - do what you can and taper off when it gets to be work). But, again, if you are a part of my culture, whether or not it is yours, that time is rarely available and our culture offers no notion of strategies to make what we have useful (thus we always return to work from leave more exhausted than we left). So there is a thing that can help make the whole thing a little more - as much as it seems like heresy, or, at least as profoundly wrongheaded as offering tips on how to choose the safest crystal meth or black tar heroin out there (neither of which I have actually tried, so don't ask me) - efficient
This one is just a matter of visualization, and, in a way, a matter of throwing energy at a problem that energy doesn't fix. Doesn't fix on its own, anyway, this is a matter of intention. Framing things as a visualization is a weird way for me to do it, since I am far more tactile than I am visual, but what the hell.
You want to start by grounding, but, if you're the sort who starts throwing open the channels when you ground and picturing energy flowing through you, you may want to try and hold back a little. This is more passive. For me, it is like waves coming in on low tide. Let energy in, but don't make it flow quickly or hot or bright or whatever you would do to raise up a good head of steam. Keep it dark and cool and slow.
Follow the energy and feel where it goes. Or see where it goes. Or listen for the echoes (actually, that sounds kind of cool. I ought to try that). Get a sense of those pathways, and let your energies move through them passively. Relax your body for this one.
Once you've got it, make your intention to fill the cracks, fix the pipes, straighten what is bent. Let this go for a while. If you nap, that's pretty cool, and if you nap as a habit, this is a good meditation to get used to doing when you go for a nap. I always feel funny when I try it for a night's sleep - any meditative state when I am sleeping tends to extend my consciousness into stages of sleep for which you really don't want to be conscious, because sleep paralysis is scary when you're consciously aware of it, but that may just be my own brain damage.
Try to go for about half an hour or 45 minutes. After that, slowly, over the next couple of hours, increase the flow of energy (this will happen naturally if you engage in any normal activity - just ease into it a little). The whole cycle will take you about 3 hours minimum to get back to a semblance of full capacity, if you really need to get there. Otherwise, keep yourself on light duty (not total rest, or you're likely to get restless) for the rest of the day. Take a walk that ends about an hour before you go to bed.
That's what I've got today. Off to take my own advice.
January 1, 2011
The Grimoire Day 12
Today, an actual short post to share with you the on bit of fancy witchy material I still use - signature ingredient of one of the people who taught me witching at college (and is reading these *waves - also doesn't use your name in case you don't want your -at least comparatively- professionally motivate LJ to be linked with witchiness ) that always finds its way into my work, too.
Usually, when I'm using herbs, I'll go look for something that seems right for the purpose, out in the world. Living with a horticulturist in training means I kind of am, too, so I'm actually kind of excited to use more local weeds and leaves for witching, but one thing that I will probably use until the day they my toes curl up under some farm house is dragon's blood.
When asked - this is tradition - what it is, you're obligated to simply restate its name. When asked how you get it - this is also tradition - the answer is "First you have to find a dragon and then ask it very politely to bleed so you don't have to."
Actually it's a plant resin, coming from a number of different plants. A pretty big number, most of them from islands off the coast of Africa. Knowing what plant it came from is sort of important if you want to do anything medicinal with it (which I don't recommend, especially not with this stuff - and, actually, I don't recommend it in general with any herbal thing [or at least the ones more exciting than say what shows up in herbal teas] until you do some research - some of them do have science behind them and some are utter bunk.)
Anyway, dragon's blood. Just about any witchy store will have it, could order it (I like to give them business) and, of course, you can get it on the internets.
So what do I use it for? Anything I don't mind staining rusty red in at least one place. Whatever I do or make, if I look at it and decide "not big enough" I break out the dragon's blood.
I mean, technically, you don't *need* it for anything - though on its own wikipedia says it's "used to increase the potency of spells for protection, love, banishing and sexuality" - frankly, half of everything you're likely to do with magic. If you know some Hoodoo, I guess it's good for raising up power and drawing good stuff to you, also making sigils, all of which we're going to talk about sometime.
Generally speaking, if you're doing at thing, and you want it to be moar thing, and you don't need to be subtle or gentle, that's when I use it.
Usually, when I'm using herbs, I'll go look for something that seems right for the purpose, out in the world. Living with a horticulturist in training means I kind of am, too, so I'm actually kind of excited to use more local weeds and leaves for witching, but one thing that I will probably use until the day they my toes curl up under some farm house is dragon's blood.
When asked - this is tradition - what it is, you're obligated to simply restate its name. When asked how you get it - this is also tradition - the answer is "First you have to find a dragon and then ask it very politely to bleed so you don't have to."
Actually it's a plant resin, coming from a number of different plants. A pretty big number, most of them from islands off the coast of Africa. Knowing what plant it came from is sort of important if you want to do anything medicinal with it (which I don't recommend, especially not with this stuff - and, actually, I don't recommend it in general with any herbal thing [or at least the ones more exciting than say what shows up in herbal teas] until you do some research - some of them do have science behind them and some are utter bunk.)
Anyway, dragon's blood. Just about any witchy store will have it, could order it (I like to give them business) and, of course, you can get it on the internets.
So what do I use it for? Anything I don't mind staining rusty red in at least one place. Whatever I do or make, if I look at it and decide "not big enough" I break out the dragon's blood.
I mean, technically, you don't *need* it for anything - though on its own wikipedia says it's "used to increase the potency of spells for protection, love, banishing and sexuality" - frankly, half of everything you're likely to do with magic. If you know some Hoodoo, I guess it's good for raising up power and drawing good stuff to you, also making sigils, all of which we're going to talk about sometime.
Generally speaking, if you're doing at thing, and you want it to be moar thing, and you don't need to be subtle or gentle, that's when I use it.
cucumberseed @ 2011-01-01T02:48:00
I resolve to drink a little more wine in 2011 than 2010, but not a lot more. I'm close to what I believe is the optimum amount for me. And to get more music. And to try to write a little more than I did and send out a little more of what I wrote. And not to be a jackass, when I can. And not to feel bad about going home when my time at work is done.
December 31, 2010
The Grimoire Day 11
Legs hurt too much from bounding in the snow to run today, so there won't be any of that. I hope to get out for a walk and then home before dark, however.
Anyway, yesterday we talked about how to Clean, now, we should probably talk about why.
With things coming into your possession, it's easy. You don't know who had them before you, what happened to them or what shape they are in. You don't know if they have anything attached to them that you don't want or need. Pretty simple stuff.
Things get a little funnier when it's something you're leaving behind, because the usual warning I always got was that, if you leave something that is yours and still has a connection to you just lying around, witches will get it and use it to get you :D
Okay, that really does deserve a little bit of unpacking, and probably doesn't deserve the flip little emoticon I used to punctuate that. If you have witchy enemies, yep, they may try to grab something of yours to use to hurt you. It's not beyond the realm of possibility, but I've never had it happen to me, and I'm pretty good at annoying people. Only pretty good, but I have managed more than once. I am ambivalent about witchy fighting. I grew up on Saturday Spine Tinglers, so the law of Sympathy (if something is connected to you, it pretty much *is* you to someone who has a mind to do things for or to you) is a Thing of my Childhood, and I am fascinated by stories of curses actually working (the rumor that Jayne Mansfield died as a result of a curse directed at her boyfriend by Anton Lavey is fascinating in particular). Basically, I believe, even though I really have never seen evidence stronger than the accuracy of a horoscope ex-post-facto.
Also, sympathy works both ways. If an enemy has a bit of you and uses it to connect their will to your life and times, that connection works both ways, and you're always in a stronger position when you defend yourself from an aggressor. I find, and I suppose this is going to require more discussion later, attempting to attack someone with witchy powers to be pointless. Otherwise Dick Cheney would be... erm... hi!
But there are two cases that make ascending practical sense in terms of cleaning items, places and yourself (witchy-clean, in terms of yourself, the benefits of regular mundane bathing, I hope, are readily apparent to everyone reading this from elsewhere).
First, a sympathetic link between you and a thing or a place, or even another person or event is a trail that badness or potential extrinsic beings can follow. Again, I'm not telling you what these things are, or even that these things are, but in case they are, giving them your address is like giving /b/ your address. They may not bother you. They probably won't. But if they do...
Actually, no, it's nowhere near as bad as giving /b/ your address unless the thing that follows you home makes the TV eat your daughter, the walls bleed, or your dinette set launch itself at your skull.
Anyway, the more practical reason is to sever psychological ties with a thing. To put it in your past. Ghosts may haunt you, but memories are far more likely, and if you've experiences you want to keep in your past where they belong, cutting the things that connect them to your present is a Very Good Idea. Likewise, cleansing yourself after a particularly harrowing experience will help you continue to function, and may help keep the experience from bleeding into your present.
Might be a thing to consider before you head out (or not) tonight for the second of the three new years that are relevant to me. Cheers, and be safe.
Anyway, yesterday we talked about how to Clean, now, we should probably talk about why.
With things coming into your possession, it's easy. You don't know who had them before you, what happened to them or what shape they are in. You don't know if they have anything attached to them that you don't want or need. Pretty simple stuff.
Things get a little funnier when it's something you're leaving behind, because the usual warning I always got was that, if you leave something that is yours and still has a connection to you just lying around, witches will get it and use it to get you :D
Okay, that really does deserve a little bit of unpacking, and probably doesn't deserve the flip little emoticon I used to punctuate that. If you have witchy enemies, yep, they may try to grab something of yours to use to hurt you. It's not beyond the realm of possibility, but I've never had it happen to me, and I'm pretty good at annoying people. Only pretty good, but I have managed more than once. I am ambivalent about witchy fighting. I grew up on Saturday Spine Tinglers, so the law of Sympathy (if something is connected to you, it pretty much *is* you to someone who has a mind to do things for or to you) is a Thing of my Childhood, and I am fascinated by stories of curses actually working (the rumor that Jayne Mansfield died as a result of a curse directed at her boyfriend by Anton Lavey is fascinating in particular). Basically, I believe, even though I really have never seen evidence stronger than the accuracy of a horoscope ex-post-facto.
Also, sympathy works both ways. If an enemy has a bit of you and uses it to connect their will to your life and times, that connection works both ways, and you're always in a stronger position when you defend yourself from an aggressor. I find, and I suppose this is going to require more discussion later, attempting to attack someone with witchy powers to be pointless. Otherwise Dick Cheney would be... erm... hi!
But there are two cases that make ascending practical sense in terms of cleaning items, places and yourself (witchy-clean, in terms of yourself, the benefits of regular mundane bathing, I hope, are readily apparent to everyone reading this from elsewhere).
First, a sympathetic link between you and a thing or a place, or even another person or event is a trail that badness or potential extrinsic beings can follow. Again, I'm not telling you what these things are, or even that these things are, but in case they are, giving them your address is like giving /b/ your address. They may not bother you. They probably won't. But if they do...
Actually, no, it's nowhere near as bad as giving /b/ your address unless the thing that follows you home makes the TV eat your daughter, the walls bleed, or your dinette set launch itself at your skull.
Anyway, the more practical reason is to sever psychological ties with a thing. To put it in your past. Ghosts may haunt you, but memories are far more likely, and if you've experiences you want to keep in your past where they belong, cutting the things that connect them to your present is a Very Good Idea. Likewise, cleansing yourself after a particularly harrowing experience will help you continue to function, and may help keep the experience from bleeding into your present.
Might be a thing to consider before you head out (or not) tonight for the second of the three new years that are relevant to me. Cheers, and be safe.
Kadath earns her fault tag
![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380442897i/1319734.gif)
kadath
has put in my head the notion that Sam Flynn from late Tron: Legacy (short review, a neon version of Metal Gear Solid without the vestigial sequences where you have any input into what happens on screen. Also, Olivia Wilde is pretty.) should have been a girl. This seems to have colonized my head a little bit, and made me actually approach the narrative structure of the film - which is fucked. Let's put it this way, the camera things Sam is the protagonist, but the script thinks it's the Digital Dude. Sometimes. So you have a protagonist who doesn't want and a point-of-view character that doesn't have one. It's such a perfect mess.
This comes in the same week as this article which alleges that the prequel trilogy was a structural masterpiece, mirroring all the different aspects of the original trilogy in reverse or something. Still, without making us care about any of the characters or telling a story worth a damn.
Anyway, I have this orphan character, and I can see her very clearly, abandoned but raised by older men - surrogates for her real father - who let her get up to her own devices and now, on the cusp of accepting belated adult responsibility in the world, she has gone into the place where her father disappeared, looking for her patrimony. And I have Star Wars rattling around, because the prequel trilogy is a narrative scab that I will never stop picking.
Pick
Pick
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