Heading into harvest season

Above: I took this photo a few years back as reference for a painting. With the autumn equinox right around the corner, I thought that something with orangey trees would be appropriate! Ten points if you recognize that rock...

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So, hello, friends!

I have managed to survive a tough 6-day work week. Today is the first of my three days off, and I couldn't be happier about that. The past week has seen me getting up as early as 4:00am for work purposes! Namely, inventory... my boss was away on vacation during inventory day, and someone decided it was a good idea for me to be the one to do it in her stead. Sigh. So, that was fun. It went pretty smoothly actually, all things considered. The toughest part has been the getting up so very early. And not going to sleep early enough to make up for it.

Anyway... I haven't really done much else besides work since we got back from Faerieworlds. I pretty much jumped straight back into the grind. Oh well, have to make ends meet somehow, yes?

So I haven't really talked about the pagan group I've been attending. Well, there's only been one meeting so far, but there'll be another tonight. Every second Wednesday I believe it is. The first one was just before we went to Oregon. I wasn't exactly sure what to expect, but it turned out to be pretty great.

The three ladies who are sort of in charge of organizing the group seem really awesome. They were surprised to see such a turnout -- I think there were probably about ten people who showed up, including me. I did post the event on a Meetup group to get it a little more attention, so that might have been where some of the attendees heard about it.

They cast the circle in a Wiccan fashion, with a little altar set up with candles, athame, etc. They asked for volunteers to invoke the directions/elements, so I got to invoke North (element of Earth). This was actually the first time I've ever participated in any sort of ritual, however simple, so it was a new experience for me. I liked it. There's something about it that appeals to my subconscious, and I don't know if I can really explain it. I did say "unties" instead of "unites" at one point, but I think the North will forgive me for that... ha!

The rest of the group consists of some experienced pagans, and some who are as new to it as I am. I connected with two guys around my own age, I think both college students. One is from Brazil and brings some of his own traditions, which sounded pretty interesting.

We went around in a circle kind of introducing ourselves and telling of what we're looking for in the group. I let everyone know that I'm an artist who is recovering from graphic design school, ha. And that I'm a total newbie when it comes to all this spiritual stuff, but that I want to learn more and hope to use it to also gain confidence.

Why confidence? Well, you see, I have spent some time over the past couple years sort of analyzing where I'm at, where my strengths and weaknesses are, and how I can grow as a person. I've come to the conclusion that I don't give myself enough credit for what I am capable of. (The Fox led me to this idea, too. He doesn't believe in self-limitation or low self-confidence!) I suppose I was raised to be modest, or I naturally gravitate towards modesty for whatever reason, so when I get excessive praise I feel uncomfortable, or I feel like I haven't earned it. When really, I am good at lots of things, and I should probably recognize that instead of brushing it off as luck or saying that anyone could do it. Let's take the inventory at work as an example. Why was it entrusted to me? Because my bosses know I can do it. (Or possibly because I said yes when they asked me to do it. Haha.) They know I am particular, detail-oriented, and thorough enough to ensure that everything is counted and entered into the system correctly, even though I've never done it before.

So why do I try to brush off praise? I guess I'm afraid of looking like an egomaniac. There's nothing more annoying and abrasive to me than arrogance and inflated egos, so I suppose I tend towards the opposite end of the spectrum in order to avoid being that which I hate.

I suppose I need to find the perfect balance between modesty and confidence. I'm hoping that the pagan group will help me with that. I mean, if I can learn to confidently invoke an element during a ritual, and take myself seriously there, I can apply that to other areas of life, too.

Anyway! Turns out that one of the leaders is a professional life coach and motivational speaker, or something like that. I'm not exactly sure what the correct term would be, but it sounds like what she does for a living is pretty relevant to what I need to learn. So that's pretty cool. Maybe she'll share some tips with me!

So today is the second meeting. We'll be doing a little bit of planning for an upcoming Mabon celebration at the Unitarian Church, and then apparently there's a political debate between local candidates that they want the pagan group to attend. Connecting pagans with politics! I can get down with that. I've been following the electoral campaign, and as far as I can tell it's going to be one of the more significant Canadian federal elections. If we don't get the Conservatives out of power we're pretty much doomed to more environmental destruction, which should be a global cause for panic at this point.

I don't want to get too deeply into that, as this isn't a politics blog and I'm no political scientist, but I can totally see the connection between paganism and politics. Respecting and caring for the Earth is a core part of this spirituality and it has never been more urgent as it is now, so we do need to take some action and make our voices heard to the higher-ups.

Anyway... so that's the pagan side of things these days! I still feel a little weird calling myself a pagan, but my beliefs are the same as they've always been. I haven't converted, because I haven't changed my beliefs... I've just applied a label to them. My friends aren't really surprised, haha. They're all good people though and don't care what I believe (as far as I can tell) as long as it's a healthy and safe path. I haven't exactly announced it to my family because I don't think there's a particular need. I'm not keeping it secret, but I'm not going to make it into a huge deal either, because I don't think it is -- to them, anyway. I'm the same person I ever was. My mom knows (well, I gave her this blog link -- hi!), but she's very open-minded and accepting, so she doesn't really care what I'm doing as long as it's not a cult. I'm lucky to have such a good family.

In other news, I haven't taken up the Artist's Way yet -- been too busy with work the past week since we got back from our trip. But I intend to start again. I think I'll turn the morning pages into the evening pages for the sake of my health and sanity. 4:30am is too early. But I do miss doing my artist dates. That was a good reason to take myself on a little solo date. Perhaps I'll do one sometime during my three days off.

The Fox and I want to go to DragonSpace this week -- I'm pretty stoked about that! One of my favourite little magical shops. I do need to watch my spending (Faerieworlds and the trip itself were not exactly easy on the old pocketbook), but we're looking for something in particular.

I guess that's all for now; I have to go wake the Fox so we can meet our friend K at a coffee shop to do some casual sketching. We've kind of stopped life drawing at the studio... it adds up, being $15/session, and it's a bit hard to make it out there sometimes. So we've been meeting up at cafes and surreptitiously sketching coffee-drinkers.

Until next time, lovely people...