While I've got your attention, Rhyd, I was wondering if you could have a conversation with Paul Cudenec at some point? From the purely selfish reason of me wanting to understand your different perspectives on Marxism and anarchism so I can have more clarity on the subject myself. Thank you!
Bravo. Beautiful. So helpful. Your re-introduction brings so much to light, makes visible much more than I was able to experience before I read it this morning. Thank you.
A sincere thank you for this. I’ve gone through periods where I felt the spirits with me and others where they certainly feel absent. When they are with me it absolutely involves being more disciplined and in shape.
The gym and fitness are difficult enough, but I have a wonderfully neurodivergent mind that also affects my body and seems bent on making things much, much harder than they already are. Cycles of prolonged sleeplessness since I was a child. High reactivity to so many kinds of foods it seems impossible to track or know what is working. Today, I’ll simply go to the gym and start back there and try to go forward one step at a time. Thank you again for the reintroduction, inspiration to shape oneself, and written nakedness.
Your writing is always a delight to me: a resource of information and reflection that I look forward to. This piece is a great reminder that life is a journey, an advent-ure, a movement from one place and phase and station to the next, and also that any differences between our current shapes (I'm an aging hippie living like a peasant nun on ten feral acres in New Zealand) are apparently irrelevant when it comes to our mutual conceptions. Goddess definitely alive, magic definitely afoot...
Thank you for this piece, Rhyd, as it intersects my life in numerous ways I didn't expect.
I have also been writing, although I've been working on fiction more than essays. And the shapeshifter is one of the biggest trends out there right now, to the point that it is impossible to avoid. While most is of that "gay romance" genre written by and for straight women, I find it sort of dovetails with larger cultural trends (like the current furor around gender), as if we are all transforming into something new. Or at least feel constrained by the old forms.
And as an artist, I've worked with stone for over thirty years and I can say there is a spirit within it. While I've met plenty of New Age Crystal Clutchers that take this to extremes, there is something (in each individual stone as well as types of stone) that must be accommodated if you want to create anything. Ask any artist and they'll probably tell you how much of the process is staring at the block of stone, or a blank canvas trying to let it tell you what it wants to be. It's a form of magic, but one I can't really explain.
Really inspiring to hear you referring to your strength training as 'ritual body work'. Over the past couple of years I've come to realise that my training at the gym and running and more recently yoga (combination of strength, fitness and flexibility) are to shape me into a 'strong vessel' for my Gods. For Their inspiration and for the challenges of life as a polytheistic monastic. I'm certainly going to be thinking about this a lot more.
Interesting piece, thanks! And great shape :).
While I've got your attention, Rhyd, I was wondering if you could have a conversation with Paul Cudenec at some point? From the purely selfish reason of me wanting to understand your different perspectives on Marxism and anarchism so I can have more clarity on the subject myself. Thank you!
Bravo. Beautiful. So helpful. Your re-introduction brings so much to light, makes visible much more than I was able to experience before I read it this morning. Thank you.
Looking good! I am also engaged in this shaping you describe. I appreciate the invitation to consider this a part of magic.
A sincere thank you for this. I’ve gone through periods where I felt the spirits with me and others where they certainly feel absent. When they are with me it absolutely involves being more disciplined and in shape.
The gym and fitness are difficult enough, but I have a wonderfully neurodivergent mind that also affects my body and seems bent on making things much, much harder than they already are. Cycles of prolonged sleeplessness since I was a child. High reactivity to so many kinds of foods it seems impossible to track or know what is working. Today, I’ll simply go to the gym and start back there and try to go forward one step at a time. Thank you again for the reintroduction, inspiration to shape oneself, and written nakedness.
Coming along nicely, my friend.
Your writing is always a delight to me: a resource of information and reflection that I look forward to. This piece is a great reminder that life is a journey, an advent-ure, a movement from one place and phase and station to the next, and also that any differences between our current shapes (I'm an aging hippie living like a peasant nun on ten feral acres in New Zealand) are apparently irrelevant when it comes to our mutual conceptions. Goddess definitely alive, magic definitely afoot...
Thank you for this piece, Rhyd, as it intersects my life in numerous ways I didn't expect.
I have also been writing, although I've been working on fiction more than essays. And the shapeshifter is one of the biggest trends out there right now, to the point that it is impossible to avoid. While most is of that "gay romance" genre written by and for straight women, I find it sort of dovetails with larger cultural trends (like the current furor around gender), as if we are all transforming into something new. Or at least feel constrained by the old forms.
And as an artist, I've worked with stone for over thirty years and I can say there is a spirit within it. While I've met plenty of New Age Crystal Clutchers that take this to extremes, there is something (in each individual stone as well as types of stone) that must be accommodated if you want to create anything. Ask any artist and they'll probably tell you how much of the process is staring at the block of stone, or a blank canvas trying to let it tell you what it wants to be. It's a form of magic, but one I can't really explain.
Suit jacket with suspenders is a particularly handsome shot.
Really inspiring to hear you referring to your strength training as 'ritual body work'. Over the past couple of years I've come to realise that my training at the gym and running and more recently yoga (combination of strength, fitness and flexibility) are to shape me into a 'strong vessel' for my Gods. For Their inspiration and for the challenges of life as a polytheistic monastic. I'm certainly going to be thinking about this a lot more.