One Step at a Time

People have told me the holidays are a stressful time.  Up until recently the only stress I've had is how am I going to make it to all the Thanksgiving dinners.  I just stirred up trouble in my family's life and, sadly, I am the reason why my mother canceled the holidays.  I won't go into any details mainly because I doubt anyone wants to hear about it and I just want to push it aside.  I've said my piece to my mother, she's said hers, and what damage control I didn't fix either of my sister's will.  My father and I are just fed up.

Anywho, enough of that!  What I'm posting about is my faith.  More importantly the deities I follow.  This is more of getting myself used to talking about this and being proud of who and what I am!

Reading through a bunch of books and websites/blogs, I've come across some interesting things about picking deities or even pantheons to worship.  One big thing is some people believe that you have to be of Celtic lineage to worship Celtic deities.  I've heard the same about Norse, Native American, and even Japanese deities.  In some cases it was that you had to be of that 'race' or in that country (because we all know that the Gods can't traverse the oceans, right?).  Living in the states there isn't much in the way of native deities unless, by some standards, you begin to worship the Native American Gods.  I suppose I have a way out in the fact that I'm half Hawai'ian so I have those deities to pay homage to, yet something didn't seem right.

Going through the Hawai'ian pantheon I did find some draw to Pele and Mahina but I think it was more out of interest of their stories and my own heritage.  I dabbled with the idea of worshiping Pele but I began to notice my temper growing short.  While she is a lovely deity I figured that I would call to her in desperate times(in a sense I see a similarity with 'dark' Goddesses when it comes to her destructive nature and want to protect her children).

I thought about worshiping Nyx but, again, there was no intense connection.  I found her to be a wonderful being and very intriguing but I couldn't get myself to follow through with what I wanted.

At this point I hadn't thought about a God, just a Goddess.  One afternoon, though, it changed.  Now I have to say that when people tell me they have psychic dreams or someone/something contacts them through a dream, I am skeptical.  I know its weird but I am a very skeptical person when it comes to profound religious experiences in any religion/faith.  Its the person's word against yours.  Yes they could be telling the truth but they could easily be lying as well.

Back to the point!  One afternoon I had fallen asleep.  I usually don't take a nap in the middle of the day but I just fell asleep.  Most times I don't remember my dreams.  I wake up and I either slept like a log or it was fitful night.  This time, though, I remembered every detail of the dream in a way that just shocked me:

I was standing in my parent's driveway/back yard.  I was looking at the house and noticed that the sky was cloudy.  As I stood there, noting that it was going to rain soon, a figure came riding through the clouds on a cloud of his own.  There was lightning and thunder in his wake.  The man flew at me but 'bailed' at the last second, twisting himself away.  The man's face came incredibly close to my own and I noticed he was wearing a mask that had openings for his eyes only.  He wore a skirt that had reminded me of something out of ancient Egypt but it seemed off in a way.  His hair was shaggy and it seemed like he had horns that swept forward.  In his hand he carried what looked like a mix of a lightning bolt and a staff, and he had bony protrusions coming out of his elbows.

I woke up and was shaken, and the first thing I did was tell Grendal about the dream.  He was shocked(he knows that I 'don't' dream) and told me to write it down and sketch out the figure as best as I could.  There was some letters that had popped up with the dream, but I still haven't found a meaning(2 years after the fact) to them if there was one.

It took me a while to find out who this figure was and when I saw a statue it was almost an instantaneous "That's him!" moment.  The God that I believe came to me was Ba'al.  The image I saw and the descriptions I've read match up.  I do know there are different Ba'al's but I believe that they're aspects of the same being, and it has yet to steer me wrong.

I have found a Goddess and, honestly, I don't know why I hadn't realized that she had been with me for a long time.  Bast.  I will say that it was probably the fact that I didn't want a 'mainstream' Goddess to worship that I hadn't noticed it sooner.  Cats have always been in my life, I have loved them greatly, and they have brought me nothing but joy.  When ever I meet a new cat there is an instant liking between us, even with cats that are normally a little put off by new people or generally grumpy.  Another big thing is the fact that my mother had collected a few cat statues for a while.  One of them was a cat that wore an Egyptian necklace and was sitting rather proud.  I was always drawn to it and always wanted to touch it, hold it, and put it in my room.  When I realized there was a connection between Bast and myself, I took the statue and placed it on my makeshift altar.  Everything has been well since.

So yes.  I have a God and Goddess to worship other than the Mother and Father.  I do find it rather interesting that Ba'al has a connection with Egypt, being likened to Set.   Things always seem to come together in the end. :)