Hearthside

This is just a bit of light-hearted fun really. This weekend has been a bit too stimulating for me, but that doesn’t mean my brain wants to slow down. Weekends make me a lot more aware of the wights, because I try to carve out more time to both engage them, and also maintain the order of my environment. (Yes, that is just a fancy way of saying that Sunday is usually laundry day.) This weekend I am also feeling the spring creeping in through my open windows and thinking about outdoor projects that may need to be started. Talking about wights in the modern world can get a bit strange. In some ways it is more believable that certain rocks or trees are beings, but a lot of the modern world is fabricated. How does the modern city-dwelling animist make sense of that? Can a computer or a printer be a being? How about a car? If there are housewights, what about work wights? Do apartments have one wight for the whole building, or one for each apartment, or both? How do you find landwights when ...

It seems like some heathens focus a lot of energy on the gods, and not on matters closer to home, the ancestors, the landwights, and housewights. A healthy hearth practice recognizes that there are other beings besides the gods who demand our respect. Working with your housewight(s) is a rewarding relationship that is worth fostering. Being aware of other beings in your environment helps you understand your environment better and will help your life to be healthy, happy, and whole.  I know… it sounds like a bad sales pitch, but there really is truth to it. Getting to know the spirits of place is always rewarding. Ritualizing the routine of maintaining a gifting cycle gives it meaning and can make you feel more purposeful. Being respectful to the beings around you and engaging in the gift cycle with them will build your luck and the luck of your family/hearth.  Housewight is a rather broad term that can refer to a number of beings that you may share space with in your home. The...