Okay, so let’s try this again. I’m still frustrated. I’m still in a bad mood. But I’m not a quitter, and even if everything sucks and I’m not getting anything out of all this work, I’m still going to do it, if only because that’s all I know how to do. I guess I’ve become used to forging ahead even when I keep getting slapped down.
So I was complaining yesterday about not being able to identify my patron deities. Patron deities are supposed to be the two or three gods or goddesses you work with most closely—the ones you relate to best and to whom you direct the bulk of your prayers and rituals and so on.
Everything I’ve read says that most pagans just “feel” a call to a particular pantheon or a certain deity. I think we can agree that I’m never going to get that kind of feeling. Sure, I’ve always liked Ganesha, but I don’t really think my affinity for him is a religious calling. The chubby elephant-headed god makes me laugh, but I’m not sure that finding your chosen deity amusing is the best thing for serious spiritual work.
I’ve also always liked Athena, the goddess of wisdom and war from the Greek pantheon. Mostly, I like the fact that she’s independent and doesn’t take crap from anybody. It’s the way I wish I could be. But again, wishing I could kick people’s asses in the style of a Greek warrior goddess isn’t exactly divine inspiration.
So, since praying for guidance in choosing my patron deities didn’t work, I decided to try doing what a few of the books suggested: using divination to help figure out the right gods for me. We’ll talk more about all the different forms of divination and how they work another time. For now, I’ll just tell you that I used runes.
Runes are usually stones or sticks that have marks on them that hold specific meanings. When you pick a few at random or toss them on a flat surface, the ones that show up most prominently are the ones that relate to whatever question you’re asking.
I didn’t have “real” runes—and I certainly can’t afford to buy any—so I made my own. Oh yeah—you’ve got to love my do-it-yourself projects. I couldn’t find enough stones of roughly equal size, at least without tearing apart the flower beds outside the apartment, so I used pennies.
I drew the rune symbols on the pennies with white-out (relax—I’ll clean them after the month is over and they’ll be just fine to go back into circulation, and no one will ever have to know that I “defaced” currency—besides, these pennies were in such bad shape, I think I actually made them look better).
I think you’ll agree that my spectacular arts and crafts skills were in full force on this project. I just keep getting better and better, as you’ll see in the photo below.
So, once I made the runes, I threw them down and picked two with my eyes closed—one to represent my patron God and one to represent my matron Goddess.
For the patron God, I picked up the rune Haegl, which is supposed to be about gaining protection against enemies and overcoming obstacles. As soon as I saw “overcoming obstacles,” I realized that I was back to Ganesha, who is known as the “Remover of Obstacles.” It looks like Ganesha and I are stuck in this thing together. Maybe it’s true that the deity picks you, and not the other way around, because I just can’t seem to shake this roly-poly elephant guy.
But what about my Goddess? The rune I picked up was Man, which is supposed to relate to career growth, as well as groups of people and friendship. Since I don’t care much about groups (I’ve never been a joiner), and friendship is clearly not my strength, I guess I’m supposed to focus on career. (You could argue that I should work on improving my joining and friendship skills, but nope, no thanks.) So career it is.
Of course, I don’t have much of a career these days, but in theory, I’m supposed to be a writer. So which goddess do I turn to?
Most pagans recommend trying to work with a God and Goddess who both come from the same pantheon. The theory is that deities who come from different cultures might not get along, which would make it hard for them to work together and for you to work with them. I don’t know if I buy that—after all, aren’t they all supposed to be aspects of one overarching divine energy?—but I’m having enough trouble with all this stuff as it is, so why invite problems? So I needed a goddess in the Hindu pantheon who supports writers.
I thought that would be a tall order, but I was very happy to discover, with a little extra research, that the Hindus have just what I need—Sarasvati, the Hindu goddess of learning, creativity, and the arts—all that good stuff that I’m supposed to be doing.
So it looks like it’s me, Ganesha, and Sarasvati, working as a team, this month. Let’s see how it goes.
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