*Thyme's Thoughts*
Thyme's Thoughts



I have been writing various pages of ranting about my ideas (also referred to as treatises) ever since I began seriously thinking about Religion and Spirituality. Many of these are quite dated, so excuse the poor writing style, (I tried to stay as true to the original wording as possible) and keep in mind I may no longer hold true to some of the things I toss about in these ramblings. I post them here for your perusal, perhaps they will send your own thinking down a new pathway, or at the very least, lend insight into my madness:





  • On Spirit
  • On Religion as Fulfillment
  • On Paganism
  • On My Beliefs
  • On Magick
  • On the Nature of Reality
  • Drawing Down the Moon
  • Words of Wisdom
  • Favorite quotes from Starhawk
  • On Polarity

    *Spirit*

    Spirit is that little *spark* within everything. That little *something* that makes it go. *LIFE* Not in the scientific sense of breathing and moving, but that inner energy that glows within everything in nature. That light that emotion that feeling without words that is within and behind everything natural. That forms the, well, the force that holds us all together. If you are connected and aware of spirit, you are spiritual, That is what religion is for -- to fulfill spiritual need whatever way you wish. The important thing is that you are fulfilled and happy.

    Back to top

    Religion as Fulfillment

    The point -- the underlying point of any religion or belief system is to be spiritually fulfilled. This is why there is no "true" religion. Religion isn't about truth -- its about fulfillment. The same things may not fulfill everyone. It doesn't matter what path you follow as long as your need is fulfilled. This is also why it is not wrong to not be religious. If you have no spiritual needs than a beliefe is not necessary. Religion is a personal adventure and you go about it in a way that suits you. If as a person you prefer a strict and structured dogrma -- so be it. People's points of view are different -- just as our needs are different. Religion is about personal fulfillment not about "right and wrong."





    Back to top

    Thoughts (August 30th 2001)

    With where I am in my religion now -- I have really lost the need for specific names and categories. I don't call myself "Nowan" really anymore -- though my beliefs are still the same -- and if I wanted to, I could. My religion is relly almost like a Native American religion -- going back to animism really. Belief that "god" lies within all things in Nature. Sometimes I wonder why Native American religions are not looked down upon the way Pagan religions are. Especially when some are so close in belief. One of the reasons I am so attached to my beliefs is their simplicity. Spirit, God, Love whatever you call it -- is here on Earth -- it is in everything is all around. It is not some all powerful allknowing incomprehensible entity far off -- watching and judging. It is here within me and around me. Embracing life -- being one with it. I would not wish to see it any other way.



    Back to top

    I am not...

  • I am not a Pagan because it's popular (among "different people that is).

  • I am not a Pagan just because I want to be different.

  • I'm not a weird cult figure who dances naked in the woods and chants.

  • I'm not a sadist or a satanist.

  • I'm not any different from you.

  • I'm Pagan because I love nature.

  • I'm Pagan because I respect people's choice to religion and I believe we all hold our own truths.

  • I'm Pagan because I believe in the power of spirit and the elements.

  • I'm Pagan because I want to help and heal myself and others.

    Iwrote this when I first started down my path in 1999. Childish, perhaps, but genuine.



    Back to top

    What is Magick?

    (Jan. 27th, 2002) What do I really believe? Magick is not supernatural. Magick is the manipulation of energy from within and without to serve a certain purpose. This energy is non-material, spiritual...does not truly exist in a literal sense. It exists because the practitioners believe it does. This is a part of the personal reality theory. But can this non-existant energy be used to influence things out of the practitioners reality? To a point, maybe. Sometimes I say the placebo effect is proof that magick is real. This is definitely the most unclear point of my religion. I dont really understand magick or what I am willing to believe about it. Hmm... Definitely one can use magick to improve the self...like meditation. Spiritual energy. Forcing oneself to focus on a goal etc. I think I believe that spiritual energy has power to heal, to accomplish things -- up to a point -- but does this contradic my scientific thinking and basis or no? ACK! Maybe psychology is the answer here -- "sprititual" energy can be used to heal the ills of the soul -- the way that psycho analysis heals the mind. Physical ills cannot be changed except in the mental approach -- basically the placebo effect. Okay that sort of makes sense to me. Within this framework we create our own reality; two realms, physical and spiritual. One's laws cannot apply to the other. That seems fair. I am afraid to get too fantastical with my beliefs, reality and logic and reason are so fundamental in my daily dealings and so basic to my outlook and principals --I must be consistant. I worry constantly that I contradict myself and that all the Pagans of the world are really crackpots. But I know this is not true. It's so hard to know what to go on. I wish I had some kind of trusted mentor in this field. I have no learned adult who I truly trust and respect that I can discuss and better understand these topics. The adults on my message board are distant and I dont know how reliable they are -- if I would trust them. I can't imagine anyone who takes the whole thing seriously. Perhaps I shouldn't. Perhaps it is a phase -- my heart tells me not, but I am afraid of the whole thing really. I just wish there was a well respected adult who I could trust and be taken seriously by. Who would be willing to discuss the topic as an actual issue and not a crank. I dont know it seems like there must be someone.

    This lengthy bit of rambling from nearly 3 years ago was sort of a soul-searching moment. I have worked a lot of these thoughts out, I am still working. Thought perhaps sharing my thought process and feelings might encourage other thinkers out there. Also, recently I have in fact discovered the kind of person I was looking for... My english teacher at college, who is an extremely intellectual and logical person is a Pagan, too. I have not had too much time to talk to her about it, but she has discussed related topics in class, and the knowledge that an intelligent, grounded person has similar beliefs fills me with confidence.



    Back to top

    Thoughts on Reality

    As there is no universal truth -- there is not truly one universal spiritual reality, correct? Perhaps in "reality" there is nothing at all, but within our own personal realities (conscioussnesses) we create several different "truths." We are all correct because none of us are right. However, because they are made up they are real. Spirit is not science. It cannot be proven or disproven. If you create it as part of your reality than it exists because you choose for it to. If you do not, than it is not real for you because you choose not to see it.

    Or perhaps - spirit does exist -- and it is our perception of it that becomes our own reality. It exists independently but our perception is what makes it real to us. Should we not percieve it -- than it does not exist. One perception or another is not "correct" persay, only different, and how far one goes to explain their perception varies.



  • If we each create our own reality then one persons reality cannot directly effect anothers, right? But if this is true, manipulation of energy in my realm cannot effect the outside of it anymore than their God can smite me.... perhaps it is subtler than this...



    Back to top

    Drawing Down the Moon (12/11/03)

    Praise the Goddess for Professor Lyman. Long ago I pined for a respected adult, pagan figure and last semester I was blessed with my college English Professor - Jaque Lyman.
    At first I did not know she was Pagan; but I immediately loved her intellectual, independent, witty style. Bit by bit it creeped out... we were studying Arthur -- she knew LOTS about the Celts and briefly talked about Paganism in class. On Samhain she spent the entire class discussing it! And she recommended Margot Adler's book -- Drawing Down the Moon. At this I was practically sure... then one day she spotted my pentacle, grinned and said "Nice necklace." At my conference on my paper she asked me if I was a practicing pagan and we finally got a chance to talk. I told her how glad I was to find a stable, intellectual adult who believed as I did. I was so nervous though to talk to her. I guess because her opinion matters so much to me. Today, or tonight rather, I finally got a hold of Drawing Down the Moon -- its bloody brilliant. And reliable. It says so clearly so many things I have pondered and re-pondered over the last five years. There are tons of insightful quotes I want to copy in here and/or put on my website. Ah, I am so glad I met her. I emailed her and told her how much I am enjoying the book. Huzzah Huzzah Huzzah all is well in the world. ~Thyme

    Words of Wisdom
    (12/11/03) Brilliant Thoughts from Margot Adler's Drawing Down the Moon

    "Upon opening its pages, perhaps they said 'I never knew there was anyone else in the world who felt what I feel or believed what I have always believed. I never knew my religion had a name.' To these people, this edition is dedicated."

    From article by Lynn White:
    "In antiquity every tree, every spring every stream every hill had its own genius loci, its guardian spirit...By destroying pagan animism, Christianity made it possible to exploit nature in a mood of indifference to the feeling of natural objects."

    Issac Bonewits:
    "The Pagans were tolerant for the simple reason that many believed their gods and goddesses to be connected with the people or the place. If you go to another place, there are differnt gods and goddesses, and if you are staying in someone else's house, you're polite to their gods; they're just as real as the ones you left back home."

    Adler:
    "Bonewits called monotheism an aberration, but "particularly useful in history when small groups of people wanted to control large numbers of people."

    Alkmene (Priestess in NY):
    "A monotheistic religion seems analogous to the 'one disease-one treatment' system still prevalent in modern medicine. When worshippers view deity in a single way this tends to feed back a homogenous image. The worshippers begin (1) to see homogeneity as good and (2) to become homogenous themselves. Eccentricity becomes 'evil' and 'wrong.' Decentrilization is seeen as wrong since what is wrong for 'A' cannot possibly be right for 'B.' A polytheistic world view allows a wider range of vhoices. A person can identify with different deities at various times. Differences become acceptable, even 'respectable.'"

    Whole Earth Catalogue:
    "We are as gods and might as well get good at it."

    Issac Bonewits:
    "Polytheists...develop logical systems based on multiple levels of reality and the magical Law of Infinite Universes: 'every sentinent being lives in a unique universe.'"

    Adler:
    "I have noticed that many intellectuals turn themselves off the instant they are confronted with the words witchcraft, magic, occultism and religion, as if such ideas exact a dangerous power that might weaken their rational faculties."

    Adler:
    "If neopaganism were presented as an intellectual and artistic movement...academics would flock to study it."

    Odun Arechaga:
    "That is the whole purpose of mythology, to familiarize yourself with certain mysteries in an unmysterious way through storytelling."

    Adler:
    "On one level the gods are examples and models -- inspirations, self aware personifications of the forces of nature."



    It's so strange and wonderful to see so many of my thoughts put into such wonderfully constructed sentences. ~Thyme...

    Back to Top

    Favorite quotes from Starhawk's The Spiral Dance

    “Unchecked the life force is cancer; unbridled the death force is war and genocide. Together, they hold eachother in the harmony that sustains life.”

    “Witchcraft does not maintain, like the First Truth of Buddhism, that ‘All life is suffering.’ On the contrary, life is a thing of wonder.”

    “Creation did not happen once in a fixed point in time; it goes on eternally, occurring in each moment, revealed in the cycle of the year.”p.52

    “In the Craft, the sacrifice of one’s nature or individuality is never demanded. Instead one sacrifices to nature. There is no conflict, in Withcraft, between the spiritual and the material; we do not have to give up one to gain the other.” P.54

    “Witchcraft does not demand poverty, chastity, or obediance but it is not a ‘looking out for number one’ philosophy, either. It developed in a close-knit clan society, where resources were shared and land held in common. ‘Charity’ was and unknown concept because sharing was integral part of society, a basic expectation. ‘Number one’ existed only within the fabric of society and within to web of all life.” P.54

    Back to Top

    On Polarity
    Male and Female energies... more thoughts while reading Spiral Dance

    Monday, August 16th, 2004

    I've been trying off and on to read Starhawk's book but I feel like I've been unable to absorb it properly because I haven't really had time to concentrate. Either I've been guiltily sneaking in paragraphs knowing I'm supposed to be reading something else, or I'm reading on an airplane (a situation that speaks for itself.) I've been trying to understand my beliefs/feelings about polarity. When I was first practicing witchcraft I used non-specific Goddess imagery exclusively (notice the terminology here. Part of my brain is stubbornly insisting that because we are not dealing in physical forms or truths, contemplating which "imagery" I use is not necessary. There's probably some truth to that.) In my late years I've become much more inclusive of all kids of imagery -- naming Gods or Goddessess of mythology, etc. However, reading Starhawk's book has made me realize and confront my tendency to avoid/ignore male energies in magick & in the universe. I am not sure why this is the case. I have never conisdered myself a feminist, I have no aversion to males, in fact I often get along better with men than women. What it comes down to is my physical sense. When I am in nature or working with the earth's energies I feel a distinctly female presence there... Perhaps the old "mother earth" phrase is worked into my psyche -- or perhaps I still feel the need to toss of the oppressive Catholicism I associate with male divinity.

    However I look at it thought, I wonder if I am not being inconsistent or something by subordinating (even ignoring or omitting) male imagery from my own mythology. I think I honesty have a hard time being in-tune or connecting with those energies. I think I'll have to start seeking to understand them in myself and then see if that doesn't help me lock them down in nature and in magick.

    ~Thyme

    Back to Top

    Hope you're enjoying all of these musings! Most of these are quite old, just scribblings among the pages of my correspondance book. More of my rantings and ramblings as they come...

    *Thyme




    Back to the Grove * The Beginner's Path * The Clearing * Thyme's Tree