It makes me laugh...

I went to church with my parents on Sunday for the first time in several weeks (I had been luck enough to miss the last couple of weeks from being sick and having surgery), and tried not to laugh out loud during the service. The sermon was on the Antichrist. As soon as I saw it on the program I knew that this was going to be good. Of course now I can't remember half the things that were said, but I'll come back to this once the sermon is posted on the church website so I can go back and listen to it again. But at one point the way the pastor was describing the Antichrist made it sound like Christ was the Antichrist...if that makes any sense. lol He was saying that the Antichrist will come out of obscurity and rise to leadership through charisma and not military power. And that people will pledge themselves to him and surrender their power. Hmmm...now didn't Christ come out of nowhere. He was born in a manger in a small town to a carpenter. He wasn't the son of any great leader and he wasn't famous. But somehow people were drawn to him. He didn't use force to get people to follow him. What was that line? Oh yeah, something to the effect of "take up your cross and follow me" or "follow me and I will make you fishers of men." Seriously? And then Christianity becomes the largest religion in the world. I don't know about you, but Christ and the Antichrist sound a lot alike to me.

I guess in the end I'm just glad that I don't believe in Satan or the Antichrist. I will say that I don't deny that Jesus was a real person and did some amazing things for people. Sure he was a healer, but I have trouble with a lot that the Bible claims happened. I mean, have you ever noted the dates in which the books were written. They are decades after Jesus' time and yet many claim to contain direct quotes from him. I don't know about you, but I can't even hardly remember a general summary about what my professors say in class, let alone be able to give direct quotes. But that's just my opinion. Maybe people had better memories back then. But unless they had a tape recording or a written transcript (which I'm fairly certain they didn't), then I have a hard time finding the information credible.

Ok, that's enough of a rant for now. I just found it all a little amusing. I don't see the point of all the doom and gloom talk. Sure the economy is down, but it's not the Great Depression yet. I'm sure they thought it was the end times back then too. But we're all still here, so obviously it wasn't. People need to be a little more optimistic. I think if more people followed a more earth-based belief system, then they wouldn't be brought down by what some people claim may happen now or a thousand years from now. What if all the doom and gloom in the Bible is just a way to give people false hope that someone is going to come along and save them.

Blessings Needed

I could use any blessings, thoughts, prayers, positive energy, well wishes, etc. that you can send my way. I was hospitalized for 5 days and must now undergo surgery to have my gallbladder removed. It should be a simple operation, but it's my first. So I'm a little nervous about it.

Thanks and blessings to all.

Lyra

More Creativity

I created a new image for myself in photoshop today. I blended a picture of myself (or pretty much just my eye) with a picture of a hawk. And then I did a bunch of enhancements and fun stuff. So here it is...I absolutely love it!

Personal Symbol

I've been feeling artistic lately and I've just felt the need to draw something as expression of myself. So I drew my own personal symbol. It is two hands that form a heart with a hawk in the center. Each hand is also an abstract hawk. And of course my name written across the top. It took me a while to get the symmetry of the hands just right. I drew it out on paper first, then I took a picture of it with my digital camera. I uploaded the picture into photoshop and traced over the picture.

So here is the original photograph of my drawing...
And here is the final product...

Unusual Animal Sightings

Lately I have noticed an increasing amount of unusual animal sightings. I've been researching each animal after I see it, but I'm not really sure how to interpret the signs.

It started a year or so ago when I was laying out on my parent's roof looking up at the stars. As I was meditating I asked the Goddess to guide my path and give me clarity. A few moments later a bat appeared and began flying around above me. Then maybe a month or so later I made a similar request and the next morning, as I walked out into my parent's garage, I noticed a bat hanging from a cable above the door. We keep the garage door down and all of the doors closed at night, so I have no idea how the bat even got in there! (I was able to capture it in a net and walked him to the woods about a mile from the house and let him go.)

I've also noticed red-tailed hawks around me constantly. About a month or two ago I was driving home from class and was just going in to pick something up before going to pick my daughter up from daycare. As I pulled into the driveway a hawk flew above me and landed on a nearby tree. When I came out of the house it was still there and as soon as I got in my car and started backing out of my driveway it left. In the last couple of weeks it seems like they are everywhere. There are two that constantly circle over my school campus (in the middle of a fairly large city which I find rather unusual) and also two that circle over my daughter's daycare.

My most recent encounter was yesterday. I was driving on my way to school and a large bird, unlike anything I had ever seen before, darted across the oncoming lanes and stopped in the grassy median just as I passed by. Then as soon as I was past it, it ran back across the road in the direction it had come from. Then not five seconds later I saw two more of the same bird flying towards my car and passed overhead. I'm still not completely sure what kind of bird they were because I have never in my life seen anything like it, but I've researched online and I *think* they were cranes. The night before I saw the cranes (or whatever they were) was the New Moon in Aries and I did meditate and ask the Goddess to help me embrace my spirituality and become more in tune with myself and to help me develop my psychic awareness and abilities. So I'm thinking that may have something to do with it.

I think it's obvious that I'm being sent a message, but I just can't figure out what it might be.

Brightest Blessings!
Lyra

New Moon in Aries

Tonight is the new moon in Aries. It is a time of spiritual awakening and new beginnings. I've been trying to put together a ritual to perform tonight, but I'm having trouble coming up with ideas. I definitely have areas I want to work on...relationships (or rather the lack thereof), awakening my senses, and developing my spiritual abilities. I'm just not sure how to go about it. But that's how it is with me. I can never plan in advance because I never know what I need to do until it's time to do it. I suppose that can make it more powerful (instead of doing something just for the sake of doing something), but it can be really irritating.

Perhaps I need to go meditate and let the ideas come to me, instead of sitting here on the computer searching aimlessly. >sigh< I'll definitely post tomorrow with what I came up with (if anything). So, until then may your day be filled with blessings!

Lyra

Merry Meet!

I suppose it's ironic that I started this blog on a Sunday, my least favorite day of the week. Like any average family we go to church on Sunday. My parents are big Christians and are narrow minded enough to think that anyone who isn't Christian is going to hell. I guess it's a good thing that I don't believe in that kind of thing. Maybe one of these days I'll tell them I'm pagan, but until then I'll suffer through.

I guess for my first post I should tell you a little more about myself. I'm 25 years old and finishing up college. I have a little girl who is currently 8 1/2 months old. I'm a single mom, which definitely has it's challenges...including the fact that we live next door to my parents. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for the home that we have, but I just feel that I have absolutely zero privacy. I can't go anywhere without them needing to know where I'm going and when I'll be back. Plus they just waltz right into my house if they need something even if I'm not even there! Which means that I can't even maintain a permanent altar.

I feel as though my spiritual practices suffer because I can't be completely open. I have to hide so much of who I am because I can't afford to lose everything that I have. I don't know, maybe I'm making too much out of it and not giving my parents enough credit. I'm just afraid that they won't be able to accept me for who I am. You would think that if they could accept me having a child out of wedlock, then they would easily be able to accept that I'm pagan. But I'm not so sure. I'm sure they would have to have seen it coming. My interest in the occult began when I was only 11 or 12 years old.

I was always interest in Norway and Norwegian customs (which is a whole different story, in short I'm adopted and unsure of my heritage, but I've always felt a connection with Scandinavia). I learned everything I could on the subject and I came across runes. For those who are unfamiliar with runes, they are an ancient form of writing and often used in divination and ritual work. Anyway, by the time I was 12 I was fluent in runescript (I even taught my friends and we wrote our notes to each other using rune so that no one else would be able to read them). In my early teenage years I came across as set of rune stones made from hematite. I've been divining from them ever since!

I've also always been close to nature. I grew up on a large farm with over 300 acres of land. I spent most of my childhood outdoors. I could spend hours just sitting under a tree or by a stream or lake. What really calls to me though, is the moon and the stars. I love to sit outside at night and stare up at the sky. So I guess following an earth-based religion just makes sense to me.

Well, that's all for now. I'll post more later and go into more detail on different things. Have a blessed week!

Lyra