The Pagan Yogi

There is so much talk at the moment about ‘Wokism’ and the need to ‘protect’ children and kids from ‘dangerous gender ideologies’ - and it feels like a horrible rerun of the homophobia of the 1980’s only rewritten for the Alt. Right. But in all this talk about ‘protecting the kids’, who’s protecting the kids who are trans, or gay, or simply just ‘questioning’? This kid was born in 1967 - when everyone *knew* that homosexuals were mentally ill, criminally deviant child molesters and perverts. This kid grew up in a deeply loving, devotedly religious and socially conservative family; This kid grew up *knowing* it was ‘wrong’ that he was a ‘softie’ for wanting to learn ballet, and sewing, and art: because everybody *knew* that boys are ‘tough’ and did ‘hard things’ like sports and engineering, but girls are ‘soft’ and only did ‘gentle’ stuff like handicrafts and ‘domestic science’. This kid went to a good Catholic school during #clause28 - being taught what everyone *knew*: that gay = AIDS

I’ve been seeing a lot online about the “Modern witchcraft” trend, and the idea that you have to pay to learn or practice Witchcraft. Trust me, from a witch of 30 years;  Witchcraft is something you do - a way of knowing, Being and relating to the Earth and to Spirit (it’s literally “the Craft of Wisdom”) - it’s not something you can ‘buy’ off the shelf, or pay your way to possessing. You don’t need ‘stuff’ to be a witch - you don’t even need ‘stuff’ to do a spell: candles, herbs, crystals, tools - they’re just ‘props’: the real magic is ENERGY directed by INTENT - and that ONLY comes from WITHIN.  When I was initiated back the day (the the 80’s and ‘90’s when we were all unemployed, living in squats and bed sits and barely scraping by on benefits) we were warned to avoid those prepared to “sell their Tradition and their soul for the price of a paperback book” - and were actively encouraged to find, adapt or make our own tools and ‘magical’ items - just as the wise women and cunning me

No birth, no death The Buddha taught that Nirvana comes when we awaken to the Truth that our essential selves have never been born, and so can never die.  But this is not just a spiritual’ belief, it’s literal and physical too. E=MC2 enshrines the Truth that neither matter nor energy can be destroyed, only transformed, each into the other. NOTHING ever ‘dies’, nor is it truly ‘born’ - all things material are simply recycled, reused and repurposed. EVERYTHING that makes up what you think of a ‘me’ is actually ‘borrowed’: the minerals in your bones and cells that used to be part of the Earth, the carbon and oxygen that fuels your body that comes from the plants and animals you consume to live, the DNA that tells your body how and ‘who’ to be that come from your parents and ancestors - even the ideas and beliefs in your head that you learnt from Wise Ones and Teachers of the past - EVERYTHING that makes up ‘you’ has all previously been parts of something else Greater and more continuous t

I was asked a really good question at this months Frampton Moot :  “How does your Yoga inform your Witchcraft?” - which threw me because I don't see them as separate things, but tools for living and Enlightenment. Many Westerners think of Yoga as either a form of exercise and stretching, or as some kind of esoteric ‘spiritual gymnastics’ - rarely do they understand that it is an embodiment practice of “coming home” to the miracle of incarnation.  Yoga is only one small part of a bigger philosophy and way of being in the world, rooted in thousands of years of teachings and practices that evolved from the peoples of the Indus Valley: one of the oldest civilisations, with roots and connections right back to the Cradle of Civilisation itself, in the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia, Sumer, and Egypt - where humanity first moved from itinerant hunter-gatherers to settled farmers, and birthed a flowering of human arts, culture and religious understanding that still form the roots of most

We celebrated Beltain this weekend at a beautiful Grand Sabbat - a coming together of eight different covens and lines to call up the Oak and the May, and give our love and energy to the land. It was a truly beautiful and heart opening evening - but for the thoughtful comment from one of our young Third Degrees, after being introduced to all the familiar old faces Geoff and I have known for decades :  “Where are the witches of my generation? Where is the New Blood that will keep the Craft alive and thriving…?”  And it’s true: we used to get regular emails and requests from people all over the U.K. in response to  The Wellhead ’s pages - most of them young pagans desperate to find a Traditional Coven to work and learn with, yet unable to find anyone else online or ‘open’; that utter lack of accessible and open signposting to the Initiatory Craft was the reason we first established our online presence - and it’s how many of the Witches we’ve initiated and trained came to find the Craft a

The difference between the Western, #monotheism mindset and that of the East and of #animism, is the difference between ‘creation’ and ‘manifestation’ When you believe God to be an entity ‘out there’, a ‘someone’ who exists separately, and who then CREATES the world and man as ‘objects’, separate from ‘Himself’, you create a #dualism between ‘God’ and ‘the universe’ - ‘god’ and ‘not-god’. And that makes the World and our life in it something ‘second best’. Even worse, it paints Humanity as an object, a possession, or a ‘pet’ - who must be ‘saved’, and who must continually prove their ‘worthiness’ (and fearing His punishment and wrath). The Eastern and #occult mindset is different, because it understands that ‘the Divine’ is not an ‘entity’ separate from a ‘creation’, but that the Universe itself is the physical and temporal expression and manifestation of the Divine itself. There is no ‘God’ or ‘Buddha’ ‘out there’ somewhere: it’s all HERE - ALL god, all GOOD - and it’s all ONE.  We ar