alpine-sitte

[alpine-sitte]

Whereabouts do you live, roughly speaking, and what drew you to that place in particular?

I'm in Michigan, and that's as specifically as I will answer that question! We have really lethal lakes.

[alpine-sitte]

@actualblanketgremlin Yeah, you get it! That's basically what I am talking about. What do we need spirituality and beliefs for if not to fill our daily life with joy, interesting experiences, comfort, and convenience, and to share those with others around us? I'm gonna keep saying it cause it's something people really need to understand: the mundane realities of your daily life and the divine world of the spiritual around you are one and the same. There's no point in treating them like separate things that require different approaches.

Also kind of interesting in a funny coincidence way, but I do think about getting the powers of electricity to be in my favor a lot nowadays. On a purely practical level, this helps me be more aware and mindful of the presence and potential dangers, since I do work in a field where I am regularly a lot closer to electric powerlines than the average person. The crows that like to sit on them and caw at me every now and then definitely are great allies there.

I really don't know if I'm even talking about the same thing as other people here on tumblr when I talk about magic, cause when I think of it, I think mostly of "folk magic". The magic of everyday cultural traditions, the stuff that is often branded "superstition".

I don't know what makes people think that you need any special preparation or education or training in order to do all this stuff. There's nothing secret about it, and nothing complicated. And unless you engage in behaviors that physically/mentally harm you, I don't see what dangers could possibly be involved.

But also I think people overcomplicate the whole thing. You don't need any sort of special tools. You don't need to spend money on any of this. Literally all you need is the knowledge of what you're trying to achieve and a clear idea of what you are trying to practice. And please, let's stop acting like "trivial" activities are excluded from this. The same goes for what you desire to achieve with these activities. Nothing is too trivial of a need/desire. You are hoping for the bus to arrive on time tomorrow? That's a perfectly fine thing to want out of whatever you're about to practice!

I think as a whole, the pagan community needs to get their heads out of the clouds a bit and ground themselves and their practices. As cliche as it sounds, y'all need to touch more grass again. It's a hands-on spirituality, after all.

And genuinely, the gatekeeping and mystification of it all has to stop. There's no secrets, no exclusivity, no sacrilege, no entry barriers in paganism, no scholars, and no knowledge is off-limits.

It's the religion of the common folk. You do not need to read any books about it, you don't need anyone to interpret for you, or follow anyone's directions on how to practice this or that. And if you feel like there's nothing tangible about your paganism, if you find yourself having to believe in things rather than simply experiencing them.... it's time to ask yourself who indoctrinated you with such ideas.

[alpine-sitte]

@limelocked That's pretty much exactly what I was trying to express in my post. When people talk about magic here on tumblr (only place where I am able to interact with other pagans currently until I finally manage to locate even a single other pagan in my area or even state), they seem to have this very specific idea of a system with hard rules and specific applications that are removed from ordinary everyday life.

And that's what kinda bothers me about the whole thing? Why is it being decoupled from the routines of daily life and daily experiences of living? And are there "facts" that people simply take for granted because they're being repeated by everyone or is there actual historical evidence? And even if there is, especially if you have written records, who is the author of those records and what is their biases/privileges/personal experiences/intentions of writing down these records? Do they apply to my life? Are we ignoring oral and cultural traditions that are still alive and well after surviving forced christianization of our home and people, in favor of trying to vaguely emulate something that someone wrote down somewhere?

I think it unfairly tints the modern pagans' perception of daily life and practice as a pagan towards what was written down, while all the other aspects are ignored or forgotten about. I understand that it can be very difficult depending on where you live to experience and discover surviving examples of folk religion and folk magic/traditions/practices, but it seems like many pagans nowadays (especially those converting from Christian beliefs, with the US American flavors of Christianity being especially prone to this, seemingly) feel a strange empty void in their spirituality and can't figure out how to fill it.

Well, I have the very bold theory that focusing even more on deity worship and emulating rituals that someone else came up with won't fill this hole. It's the absence of the religious practices and traditions of the common folk's daily lives that left behind this hole, in my opinion. (There's been people much more eloquent than me with more in-depth knowledge about Christianity explaining this phenomenon, I'll edit in the link to that post here after I found it again. It's a really good read and can be eye-opening for some.) The animism, the crafts, sense of community, and enrichment of our daily lives is falling by the wayside. And it's something people feel but struggle to really comprehend, I think, if they've grown up in a very rigidly orthodox system. It's easy to say that you see the pagan world as something whole, and the pagan practice as something that is involved in every aspect of your life by default, but it's another thing to really understand it and actually put the theory into practice.

So basically, there's really no need to go out of one's way to conduct elaborate magic rituals if you're not trying to do something very specific and sophisticated with it. A little casual magic can be involved in everything you do. But then again I don't consider myself asatru or any of the nordic pagan groups really, since as my blog's url already suggests I'm trying to carve out some distinction and niche for the unfortunately very universally ignored (but admittedly elusive) alpine paganism. That's where I find it difficult to have a proper unbiased discussion with nordic pagans about this topic, since I'm not able to tell with confidence whether this is just how nordic pagans Are and comparing it to alpine paganism is pointless in these major aspects especially...or if this is something that does actually exist as different schools of thought (so to speak) in nordic pagan circles as well. These two are not completely different types of spirituality, at least that's the impression I was getting from my first interactions here, but I also don't have enough alpine pagans (or people from similar groups in the geographical middle Europe) that I can ask for their opinions and discuss this with.

It's overall a weird situation to be in, and feels like a rather fine line to walk without either generalizing too much or getting too granular.

I really don't know if I'm even talking about the same thing as other people here on tumblr when I talk about magic, cause when I think of it, I think mostly of "folk magic". The magic of everyday cultural traditions, the stuff that is often branded "superstition".

I don't know what makes people think that you need any special preparation or education or training in order to do all this stuff. There's nothing secret about it, and nothing complicated. And unless you engage in behaviors that physically/mentally harm you, I don't see what dangers could possibly be involved.

But also I think people overcomplicate the whole thing. You don't need any sort of special tools. You don't need to spend money on any of this. Literally all you need is the knowledge of what you're trying to achieve and a clear idea of what you are trying to practice. And please, let's stop acting like "trivial" activities are excluded from this. The same goes for what you desire to achieve with these activities. Nothing is too trivial of a need/desire. You are hoping for the bus to arrive on time tomorrow? That's a perfectly fine thing to want out of whatever you're about to practice!

I think as a whole, the pagan community needs to get their heads out of the clouds a bit and ground themselves and their practices. As cliche as it sounds, y'all need to touch more grass again. It's a hands-on spirituality, after all.

And genuinely, the gatekeeping and mystification of it all has to stop. There's no secrets, no exclusivity, no sacrilege, no entry barriers in paganism, no scholars, and no knowledge is off-limits.

It's the religion of the common folk. You do not need to read any books about it, you don't need anyone to interpret for you, or follow anyone's directions on how to practice this or that. And if you feel like there's nothing tangible about your paganism, if you find yourself having to believe in things rather than simply experiencing them.... it's time to ask yourself who indoctrinated you with such ideas.

[alpine-sitte]

I really don't know if I'm even talking about the same thing as other people here on tumblr when I talk about magic, cause when I think of it, I think mostly of "folk magic". The magic of everyday cultural traditions, the stuff that is often branded "superstition".

I don't know what makes people think that you need any special preparation or education or training in order to do all this stuff. There's nothing secret about it, and nothing complicated. And unless you engage in behaviors that physically/mentally harm you, I don't see what dangers could possibly be involved.

But also I think people overcomplicate the whole thing. You don't need any sort of special tools. You don't need to spend money on any of this. Literally all you need is the knowledge of what you're trying to achieve and a clear idea of what you are trying to practice. And please, let's stop acting like "trivial" activities are excluded from this. The same goes for what you desire to achieve with these activities. Nothing is too trivial of a need/desire. You are hoping for the bus to arrive on time tomorrow? That's a perfectly fine thing to want out of whatever you're about to practice!

I think as a whole, the pagan community needs to get their heads out of the clouds a bit and ground themselves and their practices. As cliche as it sounds, y'all need to touch more grass again. It's a hands-on spirituality, after all.

And genuinely, the gatekeeping and mystification of it all has to stop. There's no secrets, no exclusivity, no sacrilege, no entry barriers in paganism, no scholars, and no knowledge is off-limits.

It's the religion of the common folk. You do not need to read any books about it, you don't need anyone to interpret for you, or follow anyone's directions on how to practice this or that. And if you feel like there's nothing tangible about your paganism, if you find yourself having to believe in things rather than simply experiencing them.... it's time to ask yourself who indoctrinated you with such ideas.

[alpine-sitte]

People believe that for magic to be truly effective, it must be instantaneous and a tried and true method for every person. But my way cannot be another's way. I work with the ebb and flow of nature. Sometimes, nature is slow, prolonged. Problems and situations take time to manage, to heal, or deal with. Other times, it can be fast, but maybe not as much as people would like.

All things have limitations. Even magic, even gods. So, not everything can be instantaneous or even work for others or ourselves all the time. Just as much as some things in nature may be more effective depending on our personal biology.

When you mess with the ebb and flow, you start to break down the systems of balance. When you begin to alter and tear at the threads that bind us all. Just as there is balance to nature, there is balance in magic. When things are forced in ways, even of the ways through our sciences, unexpected things can happen. In my view, it's the way the world, the way web of wyrd works, and the will of the Norns to keep balance as they nurture the great tree. For the sake of continued existence.

[alpine-sitte]

It sounds to me like getting a new necklace (or similar thing you can keep on your throughout the day) would be a good start. If you're trying to rediscover what makes you feel connected to your deities then the process of choosing a new talisman might be a good opportunity.

By that I mean, don't just go and buy any new necklace, or even the same one again. Take your time with this, listen to what's within you and around you, and settle for something that feels like it's calling back to you. Maybe even consider making something yourself according to what seems suitable.

Not to over-interpret into a stranger's situation and I don't know anything about your spiritual journey this far so take this with a grain of salt, but: maybe your necklace breaking in the first place was a sort of broad hint that something needs to change. Maybe it fulfilled whatever purpose it had - maybe it's no longer needed for now as you may be fine on your own for a while. That doesn't have to be the end of your spiritual journey, it may just be a portion of the way that is for you to navigate without anyone's guidance. Or maybe you need to look further. Maybe for this next portion of the way, someone or something else is better suited to accompany you. Whatever it is, it definitely could be a wake-up call, a sign that it's time to open your mind again and stray from the well-trodden path that got you this far.

Advice On Staying Feeling Connected To The Gods Day To Day?

Been feeling kind of disconnected with the gods lately. I know it may seem silly, but my Mjolnir necklace broke a few weeks ago, not having that on me has made me feel off. I have a pretty high stress career, and being able to feel that under my shirt all day was always a calming and centering feeling. I know that I also personally need to dedicate more time to my faith. I need to make a more concerted effort to make sure that I am more present with the gods in my day to day, even if it is in small ways. Any advice on how to incorporate them into small things in my day to day to consistently feel connected?

[alpine-sitte]

Not the subtlest of signs. (aka some personal, recent UPG experience)

I guess I haven’t really talked much on this blog yet about my personal experiences/encounters with situations that I consider a bit too broad-hint-ish to be mere coincidences. Well, maybe it’s time to start, with the thing that happened to me a couple weeks ago and continued into the present day.

(Content Warnings, information about what to expect below: Talking about death and injury as the result of traffic accidents and workplace accidents, mentions of human and specifically animal death in the context of railway roadkill. Photos of dead birds, taken by me in relation to the specific event I discuss in this post, after the Read More. Nothing gory, though, no blood or open wounds - in fact nothing graphic at all is being shown in the photos except for the animals being very clearly dead and in an advanced stage of decay in the last photo. They were already dead when I found them. Due to the almost certain nature of their death - essentially a lightning strike - it was instant and it's safe to say they did not suffer.)

First, I want to explain the general situation of my life and why it is very heavily affected by the topic of death due to my career.

As I may have mentioned before I work for the federal railway, and part of that job reality is frequent encounters with injury and even death. Not only things that happen to me personally, but also where I’m involved in as a bystander or get told about the incident(s) by someone who was either personally affected or a direct witness. In fact, this is such a constant occurence in the average railway worker’s life that a lot of these events are told like random anecdotes in our break rooms.

The most common “victim” of the railway continues to be all sort of animals that end up being killed by the vehicles themselves or by infrastructure like the overhead power lines. Human victims are also common, probably most common among our workers since the jobs we do involve dangerous activities.

I personally don’t do any driving anymore, but I do work at a station and tend to the engines and trains there before we send them off on their way with their drivers.

So, as I do my work, I'll sometimes stumble upon dead animals by the tracks. Sometimes more literally than other times.

The other day as I was wrapping up my day shift, I walked around the back again one last time and...was met with a sight that definitely made me pause:

There's a lot of ravens and crows here, and if they touch the overhead powerlines in the wrong spot it kills them instantly. Same happens to any that cross the path of a fast moving train. It doesn't upset me and I tend not to spend much thought on it if I walk past a dead creature. But it's pretty unusual to see two of them suffer that fate at once. Like I said I was wrapping up my shift so I just walked on and back to the quarters and wondered about these two.

A coworker told me that he also saw them on the ground, and he claimed that he saw them being struck by lightning a couple hours prior. Hard to say if he saw actual lightning from the sky or "just" the spark from the powerline. I did see some charring on the wooden ties of the tracks below, but I don't know if that was there before already or new. The fact that the crows' legs were mangled pretty badly suggests to me that they could have caused a short-circuit by sitting on the powerline where its isolated parts meet the live parts (as is the case at the power poles that I found them by). Sitting only on the live parts or the isolated parts doesn't harm them, but getting too close to the transitional part does. It happens often. Either way, the details don't matter all that much, I think.

Back home, I told a friend about this since it definitely felt like a meaningful incident in some way. If this was a sign of some sort, I wasn't sure what to take away from it.

But the more I thought about it, the more I also thought about how my life has changed in significant ways in the past months (for the better, for once) and how I've been slowly able to let go of my resentment for these changes that felt out of my control and unfair at first. For the first time in six months or so, I've been slowly able to let my negative feelings about the recent events go. Of course the feelings of being wronged and set up for failure were resilient and when they would surface again, I would question whether I really should "settle for" what I have. Or if I should try to keep the flame of my resentment alight, even if there was no realistic chance for me to achieve what I was convinced I truly wanted. All I've been achieving is ruining my mood and making myself feel bitter about things that have long passed.

So when I came back to work the following week and saw that the two dead crows were still there in the same spot but now slowly decaying as the slugs and beetles thrived on their meat, I felt that I understood what I needed to do, both on a symbolic level and on a very tangible one.

I took a bucket and picked them up carefully, and looked for a suitable spot nearby to put them to rest. In a niche behind one of the power poles that probably killed them, I found a pile of twigs that reminded me of a nest, and that felt like just the right place.

(I'm glad I thought to use a bucket instead of my hands even though I was wearing my work gloves, because after I took out the birds, there was a whole swarm of bugs left behind in the bucket. I made sure to deposit them onto the twigs as well, so that they may continue their funeral banquet in the new location after the brief interruption.) They're not bothering anyone there and during each of my shifts since, I make sure to visit them and remind myself of how the possible future I had to abandon is nevertheless being replaced by a different future that may be just as bright, if not brighter. The feelings and hopes that died with that other future won't simply disappear and I'll occasionally still have to linger and grieve for them, but there's no point in letting resentment and "what-ifs" control my present. It shouldn't keep me from enjoying what I have, being grateful for all the people I was able to meet and the experiences I made, as well as being hopeful for what the path ahead may still hold.

The worldly journey of these two crows may have ended at this final station for them, but I no longer feel like my life's journey has found a dead end here. After all, no train that arrives here stays forever, either - not even the ones that call this station their final destination.

Safe travels to these spirits, and whenever they should find themselves at this station once more, they are always welcome to join me here behind the tracks and rest for a while - until they are ready to start their journey anew.

Wrapping up this post, I probably don't need to point it out to the (presumably) mostly heathen audience of this blog that the two crows are almost a textbook example of how I'd imagine a sign from Odin/Wotan to look like. I'm always a bit hesitant to "default" to interpreting anything I experience as a sign from Odin in particular, which probably sounds silly and defiant. But it's not that I somehow resent the old man or refuse to acknowledge the possibility of him trying to throw some helpful hints my way. My feelings on the matter are a bit more complex than that. I'll probably make a separate post about this topic since it deserves more space than a footnote on another post. The gist is simply that I'm trying not to miss the forest for the trees by considering other options/sources/explanations/entities first instead of immediately looking at the most "obvious" and calling it a day. I'm not ruling out the possibility of his involvement at all (even "just" partial involvement), but to me this particular incident seems similar in "style" and circumstances as some other recent ones that I'm tentatively ascribing to some other sort of entity that I'm only starting to get a proper impression of. It's too soon for me to determine its identity with certainty.

[alpine-sitte]

What I really want is a book of Norse myths that share different regional variations of popular stories, as well as any god-related folklore that's gone into circulation post-Viking Age.

[alpine-sitte]

Wolpertinger

"In German folklore, a Wolpertinger (also called Wolperdinger or Woiperdinger) is an animal said to inhabit the alpine forests of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany.

It has a body comprising various animal parts – generally wings, antlers, a tail, and fangs; all attached to the body of a small mammal. The most widespread description portrays the Wolpertinger as having the head of a rabbit, the body of a squirrel, the antlers of a deer, and the wings and occasionally the legs of a pheasant.

Stuffed "Wolpertingers", composed of parts of actual stuffed animals, are often displayed in inns or sold to tourists as souvenirs in the animal's "native regions". The Deutsches Jagd- und Fischereimuseum in Munich, Germany features a permanent exhibit on the creature.

It resembles other creatures from German folklore, such as the Rasselbock of the Thuringian Forest, the Dilldapp of the Alemannic region, and the Elwedritsche of the Palatinate region, which accounts describe as a chicken-like creature with antlers; additionally the American Jackalope as well as the Swedish Skvader somewhat resemble the wolpertinger. The Austrian counterpart of the Wolpertinger is the Raurakl.

According to folklore, Wolpertingers can be found in the forests of Bavaria. Variant regional spellings of the name include Wolperdinger, Woipertingers, and Volpertinger. They are part of a larger family of horned mammals that exist throughout the Germanic regions of Europe, such as the Austrian Raurackl, which is nearly identical to the German Wolpertinger."

Source: wikipedia

[alpine-sitte]

I’m the guy who asked skaldish that question and I just wanted to say sorry for publicly asking such an ignorant question. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful. I’m really new to all of this. I apologise.

I saw your follow-up ask just now and it should be me who apologizes, actually. My reblog was shooting first and asking questions afterwards, for some reason it didn't cross my mind that you could actually be new to the movement and simply confused about the basics still. It can be really scary to reach out to strangers on the internet about sensitive topics like this one, and you are being brave to do so.

I guess it goes to show why I shouldn't go on tumblr and talk about topics that need some subtlety after a strenuous work week! It's not an excuse for my behavior and I'll try to be more mindful in the future, so I apologize again for making an already scary endeavour even scarier with my harsh addition. When in doubt, I normally try not to assume bad faith right away like I did yesterday.

[alpine-sitte]

Ah, so the anon actually was actually new to all of this and simply hasn’t been filled on the basics yet altogether. I apologize for my stern addition on the previous ask then, good on them for reaching out.

Thank you for answering my question about periods. I’m wondering then if this whole concept of impurity in heathenry is also untrue or not?

A number of people were saying that all human fluids were impure. No praying if you had an open wound or anything. No sneezing during a ritual. But like...by their logic, you would be considered unable to worship if you wore a colostomy bag, because feces are impure. Which seems bad to me?

I’m sorry for being ignorant, by the way. I didn’t mean to anger or upset anyone. I’m new to this all, and I’m trying to learn.

You're welcome. The concept of "impurity" doesn't exist in Heathenry.

There's a few reasons why you might be seeing people claim such a thing though.

1. People want structure.

First of all, Heathenry lacks anything in the way of scriptures and doctrines. However, a lot of Heathens (specifically American ones) coming from a doctrine-based religious background, view this is a flaw rather than a feature. If anything, the lack of doctrines means they don't know what to DO to be Heathen, which can be anxiety-inducing for people who have never experienced any other paradigm.

Paradigm shifts take a while, so the way most people facilitate this is by creating their own practice observances. This provides them with a framework for being Heathen, but it's also something they understand as being for them, and is not something everyone needs to observe.

But some people try to force their ideas on others by selling it to them as "the way you do things." I can only guess why. Maybe it's because they don't feel like their own practice is valid unless other people agree with it. Maybe they came from a high-control religious environment and "converting others" is how they understand "doing religion." Or maybe they heard it from someone else, and because they're new at this and insecure they're going to repeat what they heard in order to feel like they're doing things "right." The reasons are endless, and people's minds are enigmas even to themselves.

The point is, if ANYONE's trying to tell you that there's things you HAVE to observe in Norse Heathenry, they're either lying, grossly misinformed, or simply ignorant of alternatives. Whatever the reason, it's still false.

2. The vikings were very clean compared to the rest of Europe, and many Heathens emulate this.

For lack of any scripture or doctrines, many Heathens develop personal orthopraxy by looking at what the pre-Christian Norse people (with the assumption Norse Heathenry died out with the introduction of Christianity, which we're only now figuring out isn't true. But I digress.)

One of the things people commonly incorporate into their praxis, is personal cleanliness. The pre-Christian Norse people supposedly had remarkable personal hygiene compared to members of other European societies, so it's pretty common for contemporary Heathens to adopt personal cleanliness into their practice in some way.

"Staying clean of bodily fluids for ritual" is something I've only seen practiced by folks running The Longship, and they presented it as an option because it's something they made up for themselves that made sense to them. To keep their ritual spaces remain clean of bodily fluids is something they chose to adopt after establishing a working understanding of Heathenry in their minds.

It's my understanding that was supposed to be an example of praxis, but unfortunately the nature of what it pertains to lends itself to skeevy interpretations.

(This is one of those circumstances where experienced practitioners mistake "having experience" with "knowing how to teach it." Many folks don't realize that pedagogy is its own unique skill. As a rule-of-thumb, you don't teach people exceptions to the norm until they are proficient with the norm, otherwise it creates this exact problem.

But in the Longship's defense, it was one of the first non-Folkish public-facing Heathen education websites to exist, so this is very much a situation where something was needed and they had the means to do it.)

Anyways, this misunderstanding could be a reason why you're seeing people claim this is something you HAVE to do.

(I also know the Longship also runs r/Heathenry, so take that as you will.)

3. Heathenry has a white nationalist problem

If something looks suspicious, treat it as such, because Heathenry has a white nationalist problem. Heathen white nationalists refer to themselves as "Folkish" which is a reference to the Volkisch movement of Germany, which was the social precursor to what eventually became the Nazi Party. Today's iteration is referred to as the neo-Volkisch movement, and its ideologies overlap with a number of alt-right and Hate Groups, including TERFs/RadFems for pastoral tradwife reasons.

Some of the talking points these bad actors like using involve encouraging people towards ideas or behavior that already exist in the world, but just so happens to benefit the spread of their ideologies.

For example, if people already observe "maintaining good hygiene" as part of Heathen practice, they might try to push that idea hard, so that people will see hygiene as so valuable that they would be more likely to apply it to things like "genetic hygiene" later (read: "Racial purity").

This doesn't make it unsafe or bad to be heathen. It just means you need to keep a discerning eye out, and to keep your distance from people spreading information in ways that seem very uncompromising, authoritative, and polarizing.

Remember: Heathenry is beholden to people. People are not beholden to it.

I honestly couldn't say for sure if what you experienced was cryptofascist in nature, nor do I recommend trying to verify. But having information about what that can look like can help you discern going forward.

[alpine-sitte]

Maybe this needs to be said? People, please do yourself a favor and stop subconsciously treating paganism as "Christianity Lite". Seriously.

[alpine-sitte]

If anon is actually serious about having even considered believing a claim like that, I recommend they go back to informing themself about the very basic principles and core beliefs of heathenry. This idea can only come from someone whose worldviews are in direct contradiction with a whole bunch of things heathens stand for, and someone who is confused about whether it could be true needs to re-evaluate their understanding of the basics.

Is it true that your not allowed to pray or worship when you’re on your period? I’m honestly shocked, I just found out. I’m extremely upset. I thought this religion was going to be different. No more shame about being a human. Are people really just so impure when they menstruate?

No, that's a falsehood. It sounds like something a TERF/RadFem would say. They are friends to no one besides the neo-Volkish and white nationalists.

[alpine-sitte]

(Hopping onto my paganism blog for answering, could only send the ask from my main blog.)

Thanks for the in-depth reply!

When you put it like that, it definitely does stand to reason that lots of people who come to paganism from the ex-christian religious background would "default" to polytheistic/animistic concepts that are defined by the grecco-roman models. Those models must feel the most intuitive since they're still sharing a lot of the basic underlying concepts as abrahamic religions from what I understand. It makes for a smoother transition and less jumping into cold unknown water. Looking to other models like Shinto (not the imperialistic State Shinto, of course) for realizing how some of the basic concepts we take for granted through christianization may contradict or obstruct pagan practice is a good idea in my opinion.

Of course it must be kept in mind that there's the danger of simply turning one's understanding of pagan faith from a copy of grecco-roman concepts into a copy of shinto concepts instead, so that's definitely something to watch out for.

A reasonable idea, in my opinion, would be to compare core concepts for the sake of understanding "automatic assumptions" that culturally christian raised people may have and figuring out if those are actually things we want to integrate in our pagan faith/practice or if there's different approaches that could work better for us. (Those wouldn't have to be the way Shinto approaches the same topics, obviously! The whole idea behind this "mental exercise" would be simply identifying concepts we take for granted simply because we didn't know alternatives exist. What one does with that insight is up to them.)

Quick addition/edit because my barely awake self somehow managed to not fully comprehend that part of your response: gotta disagree on the centralized shinto statement. The centralized and dogmatized "version" of Shinto was State Shinto, which was the result of the Japanese government trying to establish emperors as deities and basically laying the foundation for Japan joining WW2 as allies of Nazi Germany. There's a whole family of religions/spiritualities that are summarized as Shinto in the West and a lot of overlap with Buddhism, so it's really impossible to see it as one singular thing. The important aspects that I was referring to in my ask were the way it's practiced as a "religion of the people" (something domestic and folk, which is also how a lot of pagan customs have survived in Europe by the way despite the christianization) with the shared core concept of animism and a cycle of life and death.

While researching on different religions that exist in the world, I've finally learned what Shinto is about and now I'm starting to see huge parallels to paganism. One thing that stood out to me especially is the shinto understanding of polytheism/animism. It feels a lot more analog to what I've found out about the "historical" pagan views. Meanwhile, modern neo-pagans seem to draw a lot more inspiration from the ancient greek "flavors" of polytheism. Is this something you've thought about before and do you have any opinions to share about it? I'm really just curious if this is something other heathens have noticed/considered/discussed before.

Oh yeah, we've notice it. This happens for a few reasons:

North American society is modeled after Rome. This means we're prone to viewing Grecco-Roman models of antiquity as "the default" way of doing things, so anytime we don't know how to do something (like polytheism) we look to Roman and Greek things first…even when it doesn't apply.

The Classical Model feels familiar. Familiarity is comfy because it begets a sense of competency, and competency begets a sense of authority, and authority is something many neo-pagans wave around like cudgels to hide the fact they struggle with Christian cognitive paradigms…which they struggle with because Christian operant conditioning needs to actively be deprogrammed, and this is hard to access and hard to do. While no one's at fault for wanting to feel secure in their spirituality, it does lend itself to more corner-cutting.

Neo-Völkisch narratives have poisoned the well. The original Germanic Völkisch movement formed the ideological backbone of the Nazi Party. It also infiltrated Heathenry, giving us Folkish Heathenry. It ALSO romanticized the Roman Empire. The way the Folkish approach Heathenry is to take customs of old Norse culture and slot them into a romanticized Grecco-Roman theological model. It's falling out of favor, for obvious reasons, but a number of people still have the impression this is how Reconstructive Heathenry works.

One thing I will say, for the sake of disambiguation for followers, is that while Heathenry and Shinto are both based in animism, Shinto is a centralized religion whereas Norse Heathenry is not.

[alpine-sitte]

If the “perfect” system doesn’t involve human beings and doesn’t allow space for what makes us human, I prefer living with an imperfect one.

Sorry to break it to y'all but believing in anything, participating in anything, has the capacity to harm people. There's no perfect system of belief that exempts you from having to continually work to not be an asshole.

[alpine-sitte]

One important thing that really set paganism (and specifically its animistic focus) apart from any other belief system I've looked at in my life so far is:

When I learn about pagan concepts that I haven't heard of before, it doesn't take any "suspension of disbelief" for me like the core concepts of the religions I've learned about. Most concepts of religions like catholicism for example will make me scratch my head at best and ask things like "Wait, how does that work?" "Do people believe this literally or is it a metaphor of sorts?" "That's weirdly abstract while at the same time extremely specific. How do you come up with something like that?" All the grains I'd need to take that ideological diet with would be much better used feeding the world.

But on the other hand, it just feels intuitive and very straightforward to me when I learn about pagan concepts like the trajectory of one's fate and such. It just makes me feel like something I already knew from just living in our world and interacting with it. Someone is just putting it in words.

I think that's what makes me feel so at home with the heathen worldviews. I don't have to try and wrap my head around strange, foreign ideas that seemingly have no basis in my lived reality, or that are actively clashing with any value I hold in my heart. I don't have to do anything that I have to go out of my way to do in order to keep expanding my understanding of the world and its wonders.

And still, it's improving my life in many ways, as well as improving the way I interact with the world and give back to it. You'd think that should be a benefit of every ideology?

[alpine-sitte]

It's pretty scary to learn about these things and then start wondering just how deeply-rooted such ideas must be in the minds of so many people. Most of which might never even realize how severe the negative impact on their quality of life and their mental health is, and what they're passing on to their children in the belief it's the right/caring thing to teach them...

Genuine question, but where is this idea that “thought crimes are real” even coming from? Growing up, I only heard this concept used in reference to the book 1984.