History of a spiritual quest – part v

Tags

animal familiars, belly dancing, Canberra, fork in the road, Guru, Kali, Pagan, paganism, Pagans in the Pub, run-away stream, rune reading as an oracle, Runes, satin, shamanic, spirit journeying, spiritual quest, trance work, Vedic astrology, velvet, Vimshottari Dashas, weapons training

[Read part i, part ii, part iii, & part iv]

Now that I look at it, the path that leads to where I stand (for the moment anyway), has been this kind of run-away stream. For the most part of its own accord, it’s flowed merrily back to source with little direction from me. For a long time I simply followed the path of least resistance, come what may.

I was not purposeful, not imbued with a sense of knowing where I was going. Just had a gut instinct about where I had to get to. Like to like, I floated along – sometimes easily, others not – and with great surprise and yet no surprise, found myself at the beginning of where I’d meant to get to all along.

But growing up in a world devoid of clues as to exactly where that was, I relied on little more than my intuition and sub-conscious cues. And it took me a while to learn to trust all of that. Hence, this bizarre quest of sorts… this journey with so many twists and turns…

Picture a dust-drenched camping plot an hour’s drive from Canberra (the concrete capital), amongst parched gum trees spattered across a thirsty horizon, on a summery late-January weekend… add all those velvet and lace outfits, hippie clothes, cloaks, capes etc, in country-Australia, at a green and sweat flecked camp ground…

The Pagan Summer Gathering of 1988 was in session.

I was a long flowing skirt wearing, belly-dancing goddess woman – teaching a unisex belly-dance workshop (based on my theory of dance and movement – see point #6). J was all Celtic-warrior-hard-man-long-hair-and-beard spiritual stuff.

The day of my workshop, was country-Australia-harsh-unforgiving, get-a-tan-in-the-shade kind of hot. It was a blast, even though only a single guy turned up. It was my first ever gig teaching people something I wanted to share.

New sign post

There was also a workshop on runes happening a bit later and both J and I were interested. I’d wandered over to see what was going on, glanced at the guy who’d be leading it (someone I’ve written about here before and labelled A) and swiftly backed away. Little did I realise he was to become my teacher and years later, my lover.

I was “saved” by a good friend I hadn’t seen in a while. He pulled me aside to tell me some serious news. With a legitimate excuse to not go, I dragged my friend back to my tent to commiserate, eat food and talk.

But J did go, and excitedly returned. This guy is the real deal. He’s learned this traditional system of runes, he’s Sydney-based and will be teaching classes.

An unspoken agreement occured: we’d be going to those classes. Despite my initial reaction to A, everything that J told me sucked me in. A western style martial form with weapons? A kind of western tai-chi? Herbolgy? Mythology? Runes as an oracle?

Coooooool!

This PSG wasn’t amazing just because of this new fork in the road. It was also my first proper introduction to Kali, my Mahavidya (another story circa 2008, ten years later).

At this gathering, that slightly off-center guy (even for a group of pagans) I’d met at Pagans in the Pub was running a Kali ritual. Which involved nudity but no sex (many of these things did), mantra and dancing. Can’t remember anything else about it, probably because I didn’t understand it much.

Didn’t really think about it at the time. And so it was… Kali had already staked something of a claim. Then, maybe it’s just always been that way?

Runology

Back in Sydney, J and I and another friend started studying this runic system with A.

We’d travel from one side of Sydney to another every fortnight for about a year, learning an oral family tradition that’d been handed down from one generation to the next, and had finally been taught to four outsiders, to keep the tradition alive.

One of those four people was the man who’d become my Guru (he’s trained in many esoteric traditions). He was living in Australia at the time, so when he came back from the UK, he taught a few Australian students of his own, including A.

And what we learned was a rich and fascinating living tradition of western shamanism: animal familiars; spirit journeying; trance work; rune reading as an oracle; weapons training. And so much more. So interesting, especially since we white folk are convinced we lack such history. But in some pockets of the world, this knowledge lives on.

Around September of the same year, we were handed flyers for a rune workshop with my Guru. J was working that weekend and made the call not to change his work schedule. But I did go, staying at A’s place overnight. Which is kinda sorta where my Why I have a Guru series picks up…

Galaxy of coincidences

Something I haven’t mentioned in that series is how my Vedic astrology chart correlates with some of the monumental changes in my life. Vimshottari Dashas are major cycles of time a planet/moon rules in your birth chart and according to Vedic astrology; this can influence your activities and state of mind.

When I moved to Sydney from Melbourne at the age of twenty-one, it was smack-dab on the transition into my Sun cycle – a time of activity. And when I met my Guru, it was the exact transition from Sun to Moon cycle – good for inner work but little else!

So, major changes in my chart it seems, have equalled major changes in my life. Quite unbeknown to me at the time.

The first encounter with my Guru left me enamoured, dazed and definitely a little confused. Also, quite radiant, joyous and kinda high! I returned from my weekend up north absolutely raving about it all.

Of course, J was far from impressed. I’d say it was blatantly clear that if asked, I would’ve gone to live wherever my Guru was (that’s never actually happened, not yet!).

When I went back a couple of weeks later to talk to him some more, I was given some practices to get started with. Off-handed, and without really knowing anything about my relationship with J, my Guru said to me – Oh, so you’re still engaged? Like he was reading my inner turmoil and simply spoke it aloud…

Without doubt, that day was one of those moments where knowledge descends. But more on that topic soon. It was a quickening, a ripening, perhaps a remembering…

Down, down, down

By this time, things between J and I had been deteriorating for a good six months. We were slowly imploding, and here I was, infatuated with another man – even if it wasn’t actually infatuation in a romantic way. At the time it sure felt romantic to me, in my state of delusion and elation!

To complicate things, I’d also had something of a crush on A for a while, but told no one. Not a soul. Actually, I was kinda proud of myself that I was aware of the crush and had no plans to act on it. I was with J, and A was married.

J often blamed our relationship breakdown on my feelings for A and my Guru. But the truth was, we had our own problems and it would be wrong to blame external influences. I will admit that my Guru was a catalyst, but not in any obvious way. Perhaps it was just all part of that quickening…

As it seemed less and less likely J and I would ever get married, we both withdrew. The time of talking, arguing, pleading, crying and hoping was mostly done. I took off my engagement ring in protest, and left it on a shelf in the lounge room. J responded by playing more and more computer games with the study door shut.

Nature abhors a vacuum, so as many couples in that situation do… we found fault with each other more and more, and our focus was drawn in opposing directions. Until there was no longer a way to mend our broken bonds.

But before that, we had more rune workshops with the head of the family tradition, who’d flown to Australia. I had my very first and quite shocking experience with trance work, and found out just how deadly a half-blind old man can be in martial arts training!

J and I both delved more intensely into our mutual interest in this tradition. Yet all that time… we moved increasingly out of each other’s orbit.

To be continued…

~ Svasti

History of a spiritual quest – part iii

Tags

belly dancing, Carlisle Castle Hotel, coven, Egypt, full moon, Guru, Hare Krishna, Interview with the Vampire, Kali, Newtown, Pagan, paganism, Pagans in the Pub, pentagrams, Puja, satin, sexual preferences, spiritual quest, velvet, witchcraft

[Read part i & part ii first]

Various dark coloured shades of satin and velvet. A talking stick. Women with flowers in their hair, layers of silver jewellery and long swooshing skirts. Sequins and sparkly things. Incense. Grown men and women in robes with hoods. And capes. Leather pouches tied to belts containing runes or tarot cards. The occasional new agey t-shirt with a wolf howling at the moon.

And much beer.

This was my introduction to Pagans in the Pub in Sydney, circa 1993.

A group of twenty or so people gathered in the back room of the Carlisle Castle Hotel (yes, Pagans in the Pub held in a pub with the name ‘castle’ in the title – the puns are free and keep on coming!).

The Carlisle Castle, courtesy of Google street view

Just an unassuming working class pub in the narrow backstreets of Newtown surrounded by workman’s cottages built snugly together. The front bar was populated with stoic and gruff older men, surprised at the repeated declarations of ‘Blessed be’ emanating from the back room.

I spotted T, dressed in a dark red long sleeved shirt, a black vest and jeans, meticulous dark hair and beard. He introduced me to a bunch of people whose names I immediately forgot.

Of course, it wasn’t just ‘hi, I’m Jason’, but ‘hi, I’m Jason-Lightworker and I’m a Druid’. Or ‘hi, I’m Silverstar and I’m a Shaman’. Everyone there, it seemed, was a something-or-other-magical-label which they revelled in.

There was discussion and debate. Plenty of opinions voiced and egos marched out for all to see. The topics were decidedly unusual, but hey, what could I expect from a mixed bag of pagans?

Overwhelming is one word. Colourful is another. Whacky, free-spirited and a little lost… they’re other words.

Let me just say the start of my search in no way resembled where I ended up. But if I hadn’t taken that first tentative step (followed by many others), I never would have met my guru. Even if it was just a slightly out of the way route.

Me and T

Turns out T was one of the movers and shakers in the Sydney pagan community. He was somewhat notorious, and had been around for a long time.

Although at the time I was questioning my sexual preferences (gay/straight/bi), and even though I didn’t find T (14 years my senior) physically attractive, somehow we ended up together.

And actually at the time we met, I was in fact, dating a woman. Clearly, not for long.

That part of the story alone, is worthy of its own focus. There’s no way to write about the how’s and why’s of my relationship with T without changing the point of this story, which is my journey through the world of neo-paganism.

It was a mad eighteen months of my life in which: we went to Egypt (my first overseas trip and T is well-versed in Egyptian mythology); we moved in together (bookshelves, skull candelabras, pentagram rugs and all!); I started belly dancing (he thought I’d like it – I did); he taught me about witchcraft (not as dark and dangerous as most would imagine); we started a coven (small group of people learning witchcraft); we ran a pretty awesome dress up event for the premiere of Interview with the Vampire (another story yet again); T contemplated faking his own death (I talked him out of it)… and more.

Much more.

With T, I attended my first ever pagan type weekend gathering. You know the kind – a bush camp site with bunks and dorms, a mess hall, marquee tents and fire pits. Drums, full moon (and other) rituals, various workshops, late night jam sessions, hash, peace and love. He also took me to my very first Hare Krishna meal by donation/chanting session and we went often.

In some ways, T was the real deal and I learnt a lot from him. In other ways, he was completely stark raving crazy.

I had my doubts about T and I around eight months in. He was running away from his past, and stuck in a certain reality. I was still… learning. However, I was meeting plenty of people and being exposed to all kinds of new ideas.

That time in my life was somehow very important (which is part of that other story). I was still only twenty-two, impressively aimless and ashamed that I hadn’t gone to university.

What I learned

I was living life like it was some big adventure playground. But finally I was learning all kinds that made sense to me (at least some of it did) on spiritual topics. Things I’d written about many years ago. It was… helpful.

But the pagan scene, I found, was a little hollow. Many of the people putting on robes and turning up to full moon rituals could just as easily have been attending church. By that I mean, they seemed to want to belong and be a part of something. Have a label that worked for them. And there was little real magic going on.

I even met one guy who, despite his tattoos and piercings, eyeliner and 100% black wardrobe, claims to black magic and darkness… once said… Do you ever think about what will happen if the Christians are right?

Personally, I didn’t. I’ve never seen things quite as black and white as that.

Generally, the people were lovely and the experiences were cool. But I was looking for something else. I imagined it was like ringing a bell with a very specific tone and pitch that exactly matches my own.

And I hadn’t found it yet.

I even met a genuine yogi at that time – a Kali devotee – fond of naked puja. But it didn’t ring true, not with him. Which perhaps had something to do with the fact that I found him a little peculiar. Nice. But kinda whacked.

Endings & beginnings

Things ended with T as dramatically as they’d begun.

I’d been performing in some local theatre and he was jealous of my co-star (much closer to me in age, not to mention tall, dark & sexy). I found out later T had been following me as I walked to rehearsals!

Nothing had happened, except for the kissing required of our roles. But there was a definite flirtation going on.

T and I had put on another of our big costume parties. All our pagan friends, my theatre and belly dance friends were invited. It was a wild night with a band in the front room, local pop-rock stars in attendance, lots of dancing, drinking and madness.

For reasons known only to T, he flew into a rage after everyone had left, accusing me of sleeping with my co-star (I wasn’t, not yet). He didn’t believe me and threw me out of the bedroom, ordering me to move out the next day (with ominous threats of what would happen if I didn’t).

The threat I’ve never been able to forget is… a little too gruesome to write down.

I was sufficiently terrified and called one of my pagan friends. S said she’d help me move and I could stay with her until I found my own place.

[Read part iv]

~Svasti