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divination

Northern European Starting Points

Magical and animistic practices that are good starting points for people of Northern European descent:

  • Working with local or ancestral land spirits, for example Hawthorn, Rowan, Yew, local lakes and mountains, springs and native animals.
  • Working with local or ancestral deities and spirits, such as the Celtic pantheon, Merlin, fairies and elemental beings.
  • Working with local or ancestral folk magic, such as hagstones, witch bottles and charms.
  • Working with your ancestors.
  • Working with your kin and helping animal spirits, which could be any native species.
  • Working with divination methods such as mirror gazing, inky water, tarot and runes.
  • Personal work to honour the Earth and her inhabitants as a whole.
  • Personal work to develop deeper empathy, connection and awareness of interdependence.
  • Personal work to increase creativity and inspiration.
  • Personal work to confront and integrate dark aspects of yourself and your culture.
  • Personal work to heal conflicts and harm caused by your ancestors to the land, other people and yourself.
  • Personal work for a better relationship with your body.
  • Personal work for a better relationship with your land and environment.

This isn’t an exhaustive list, but merely a place to start working with animism and magic that honours your own heritage while respecting the heritage of others enough to not occupy it.

Those of us with Northern European heritage have rich roots of animist to draw upon in our practice, and while the animism of other cultures can be beautiful and inspiring, we have to be careful not to bring materialist and collonialist attitudes to our spiritual practice.

It’s clear that all humans have animist heritage and access to magical methods, but that when we take the spiritual language and methods of cultures we don’t belong to, we rip them from their roots, damaging both our own practice and that of the people we took them from.

Trance Practices

 

Trance is an animist practice that shifts our mental states so that we can access different ways of thinking and relating to reality.

Entering into trance is like re-tuning a radio; you don’t go anywhere, but the signals you’re picking up, and so the information you receive, changes.

Trance practices are helpful when we:

  • Want to receive new teachings from our guiding ancestors or lineage members.
  • Want to influence the physical world at a more malleable level, such as the energetic level.
  • Develop our mental and energetic flexibility, to enhance our creativity, problem solving and expression of emotions.
  • Need to divine on questions that are complex or challenging.
  • Are working on the energetic level for healing or protection.
  • Want to work through our altars to influence the relationships we’re working on.
  • Need to interact with spirits for any reason.
  • Need to gain experiential understanding of a relationship, problem or wound through spirit flight.

There are different types of trance, from the light trance we all enter when we’re reading, watching TV or falling asleep, to the deep, transformative levels of trance accessed during spirit flight, hypnosis and sensory deprivation.

Trance practices are at the core of animism, and as such can be used to enhance almost any animist practice. However, as an advanced practice there are contraindications to the use of trance, which I talk about here.

There are a huge number of methods for entering a trance. Some of the most common are drum rhythms, dance, song, sensory deprivation and single-pointed focus. The essential element of trance work is that we are changing our mental state from our normal, everyday state; anything that helps us achieve this can be a method for working with trance.

To begin introducing trance into your animist practice, you could work with the rhythm of a drum or your voice to enter a light trance before doing a divination.

For a refresher on the basics of divination practice, join the free 12 week Foundation in Animism course here:


Divination

 

 

Divination is the practice of reading meaningful patterns in randomness.

It allows us to gain a new perspective, hear the voices of the spirits we work with (without using more advanced tools like trance work), and provides inspiration, guidance and deeper knowledge.

Times when divination is helpful include:

  • When you need more clarity on a situation.
  • When you need a new perspective on a problem.
  • When you want to understand a spirit you’re working with better.
  • When you need guidance in your animism practice.
  • When you feel like a spirit has something to communicate with you.
  • When you want to develop more inspiration for a creative practice.

Divination requires sacred space, intent, a clear question and a random pattern to ‘read’. It includes structured methods like using cards or runes, as well as unstructured methods such as casting stones or reading in mirrors.

For more information and to learn how to use three divination methods, join the free 12 week Foundation in Animism course here: