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    Understanding who I am

    Who doesn't want to get to grips with what it is they actually believe.

    I'm interested in hedge witchcraft, or witchcraft involving woodland. I was raised for 18 years with woodland on three sides and I am actually learning traditional timber-framing with the intention of a career in it and owning a woodland, so the English woodland is something I have great spiritual affinity with, I also feel a particular closeness to and fascination in the elusive hare, frequently seen at the hedgerows between fields and woodland.

    I have for a long time been very interested in herbal medicine, and bushcraft has been my own ventilation for this until now. Cleavers, nettles, comfrey, rosehips, they all interest me (even if I haven't had any opportunity to use them!). I also have in the last year been considering keeping a notebook and noting everything I see in the weather when out in the countryside (I live very close to rural area, so very easy), in order to recognize patterns, cloud formations, tree movement, behaviour of birds etc. I believe that there is something beyond nature that separates the living from the dead, even if I don't understand what that essence of life is. Aside from that, I believe there is power to be found in plants, animals and minerals which is not the same as the essence of life (after all, if I were to use a bit of wood from a tree or tooth/bone from an animal, it is dead, and rocks never had a pulse!)

    What say ye, interesting people? Do you see a similarity between this and other things? Do I sound like smoke something you're interested in? (sorry I don't) or does it sound like some sort of twisted animism? For that matter I don't believe in "spirits" per se, like I don't believe in an afterlife and I don't feel the need to worship anything, but I would pay respects to powers that enable me to achieve magic, which I'm willing to believe in if I learn how it works (the closest I've been to magic is seeing casette tape strewn around trees) through forms of votive offering (putting a lit candle somewhere relevant so that it is not for my benefit). I do believe that the essence I talked about is the spark that ignites the dynamism and consciousness of all living things, rather than a spirit which dwells in any one given thing.
    I'm not one to ever pray for mercy
    Or to wish on pennies in the fountain or the shrine
    But that day you know I left my money
    And I thought of you only
    All that copper glowing fine

    #2
    Re: Understanding who I am

    I have wondered about many similar things! I do not have answers because I don't not know. I remain very agnostic (meaning I don't know) about what is or is not within the spirit realm.

    However because I think it's possible that trees, earth, plants all have consciousness, I consider their welfare to matter. I go kind of jainist like that. I think it a plant wants to share magic with you, you should learn what spirits are in or governing the plants and treat the plant well as it wants to be treated, to share gifts with each other from a place of mutual respect. Frequently when we assume other beings secrently want us to violate their welfare or life force, we are... well.. making up what suits us. We must eat to survive, but I don't think need to sugar coat that with the idea that these beings WANT us to destroy them or that we have some sort of secret agreement with them. That is how people assume that abusing others is something they have an "innate right" to do to other humans, when I think most of humanity has evolved beyond excusing that kind of thing with things we made up the divine wants us to do.

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      #3
      Re: Understanding who I am

      I know what you mean. I don't think I have a 'right' to use plants or animals, and I don't think plant life is somehow less valuable as life than animals which is why I'm omnivorous. I couldn't show voluntary favouritism. I wouldn't just cut down trees for the sake of it just like I wouldn't go out with a rifle and shoot something for no reason.
      I'm not one to ever pray for mercy
      Or to wish on pennies in the fountain or the shrine
      But that day you know I left my money
      And I thought of you only
      All that copper glowing fine

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