Eoten

Animist poet

Wild poetry, untamed stories and animist teachings from Eóten

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healing

Song for the broken hearted

Love is never lost

Never erased

It lives in the cells that remember

Touch breath embrace

The light whisper 

the laughter

It lives on in the patterns of light that flash

Through our inner darkness

It formed the pathways

Birthed this future out of darkness

Love is never lost

It is captured in memory

And more that memory in form

It lives in our every transaction

In how we smile how we sing

It lives in the shape of our growth

Like the wind in the shape of a twisting branch

Like sunlight in the reaching trunk

Love is never in vain never

Futile never meaningless

It’s fact is solid

Solid as death

Love once given cannot be taken

From us it lives in our existence

Like dna coiling through the whole

Like starborn atoms indivisible from the past

And from our futures

Spreading weblike into everything we touch

Love is never lost

//eóten

Snow Burial

Entered the space

To heal the wounded root

Deep black shards

She showed me

And deep black oozing shame

Around betrayal

 I protect

The still baby born cold

The song of bodies long buried

In the snow

I see I am to join them

Curled beneath the roots and thorns

To sleep once more

Animism Doesn’t Conflict With Science

Religion and spirituality on the one hand, science and rationality on the other.

For a long time, these two facets of human experience have been on opposing sides, clashing over everything from big, universal questions – why are we here? – to intimate, personal ones – is my sexuality ok?

Animism might seem to conflict with science too, at first glance. But animism isn’t a religion, nor a New Age spiritual movement, and it’s relationship with science can be surprising.

[Read more…] about Animism Doesn’t Conflict With Science

Animism is not Alternative Medicine

Alternative medicine is a range of “systems of healing or treating disease not included in the traditional medical curricula of the US and UK”.*

It includes many methods that you’re probably familiar with, from vitamins to reiki, and it can overlap with some animist practices, notably energy medicine, herbalism and folk magic.

Alternative medicine is a big umbrella containing everything from relatively scientific osteopathy for backache to fermented cabbage for homosexuality (no really*). Saying that a practice is ‘alternative medicine’ tells us very little about it’s origins, function, effectiveness or intent.

But a common misconception is that animism itself is an ‘alternative medicine’ like reiki or herbalism. While animist practice can include methods that have healing effects, like herbalism or energy medicine, a person’s animist practice doesn’t have to include any of these. And it’s possible for an animist to use these methods without any intent of healing or treating disease.

Animism is a highly practical path which focuses on effective solutions over ideology. Animist methods rarely conflict with traditional medical treatments in the way that alternative medicine can. Because practical and effective solutions are the goal in animism, refusing treatment in favor of unproven methods is very unlikely.

This means that if a medical treatment is the best solution to a problem, that’s the solution we use. Conversely, if it means that combining animist practices with traditional medicine is the best solution, that’s what we’ll do. Often, in Western animism, this means that animist practices are used to support the patient or prevent illness in the first place.

For example, animist methods can reduce stress, which has been proven to cause ill health. They can also be used to change destructive behaviour, such as smoking, or to support a patient in following their medical treatment more reliably.

And animist methods of working with psychoactive plants are becoming more and more recognised for their potent healing potential in social, psychological and terminal illness.*

Rather than an alternative medicine, animism is a personal and communal spiritual stance. It offers no guarantees and endorses no experts, rather demanding that we accept the uncertainty of life as it is.