The Graham De Vanilys (1970s)

these are giving off very Harry potter-esk vibes if you ask me

all your stuffed animals love you. they're not sad if they're in a box, or on the floor, or not held/played with as much. they understand. they know that you might need another stuffie more, or that you don't have enough space. they're just happy to be with you, and if you ever give them away, they'll be happy there too. stuffies are for comfort. they understand. they love you too. it's okay.

Ways the Gods Can Contact You

This is one of the most frequent questions I receive. Otherwise, I would not make this post. Worship is incredibly personal, and Gods usually contact you in ways that you don’t expect, or ways you didn’t realize until you look back on the past.

These methods listed are common ones that I often hear from others. Do not limit your communication to these steps.

You feel a very close connection with Them, even without legitimate reason. Some people feel a connection to Their area of rule (i.e. sea god for feeling close to the ocean). If you’re like me, you’ve felt drawn to a God and you don’t even know why. This could be the Gods trying to reach out to you.

A God sends you strong gut feelings. Before I devoteed to Hades, I gave Him offerings during every Sabbat. I can’t tell you why; I just felt like I needed to. One day, I thought of making an altar for Hades, and I immediately put aside all other thoughts and responsibilities, determined to create that altar. If you’ve experience similar gut feelings, that may be a God speaking to you.

Your favorites overlap. It sounds silly, but it’s an experience I’ve heard about from a lot of people. For example, if you’ve always felt connected to dogs, and feel drawn towards Aries, you might look up the correspondence of dogs and realize that Aries has a close relationship with dogs. A quick disclaimer: This doesn’t always happen, and it’s possible to feel attracted to a God you have little connectivity with.

Your environment responds to you when you speak with the Gods. During my first ever Wiccan ritual, the God spoke to me by raising the candle flame higher than any I’ve ever seen. I’ve felt the wind shift when I spoke to the Gods about change in my life. Changes like these could be signs of response, especially during a prayer or ritual.

You feel a response, similar to the last one, but more esoteric. Examples may include feeling a warm blanket on your shoulders, feeling yourself relax while speaking to the Gods, touching hands, or even smelling a certain scent from no obvious source.

You hear a response. In some cases you may actually hear a voice in your head when a God speaks to you.

The Gods come through divination, such as automatic writing, scrying, tarot, pendulum or omens. Certain signs or repeated animal sightings may also be a method of contact.

The Gods communicate through dreams, visions, meditation or hedge crossing.

Anything I missed? Please add on. And remember that these are simply examples. Listen to your instinct, and you’ll know. It may take some time.

I wish you a fun and rewarding path, lovelies! .+(´^ω^`)+.

“i will fall in love with you, over and over again”

“don’t tell me you’re not the same person”

(sorry just a sketch 😔)

I loveee in universe media!!!

i'm obsessed with this shit now

sorry, in universe social media is my roman empire now

wow i love twitter sm.

on a serious note - i think it's funny to portray women not wearing make-up as silly and childish when you're the one apparently caring so much about what other people are doing to their faces.

ask yourself: why do you find bare faces not appropriate for formal events? why does it bother you to see a woman without makeup? how does it effect you? why do you think it effects you?

you're so insistent that there are no societal pressures at play, that women are doing this exclusively for themselves and for the joy of it - then where does this urge to force it on women who don't find joy in it come from? why does it annoy you to see women in their natural way of being? it's a choice, but also there's a right choice, apparently, and anyone stepping out of line shoud be promptly shamed into submission. right?

"a little (whatever) never hurt anybody" okay and neither does a bare face. grow up.

Here’s my Hellenic polytheism and witchcraft take. Witchcraft existed and was practiced in Ancient Greece. Point blank. We have evidence in literature of extremely detailed practices and spells that mirror that kinds of witchcraft that followed centuries later. We have Simaetha, Pasiphae, Medea, Kirke, etc, who used poppets, potions, wands, and herbs. These literary figures have similarities and consistency between them in terms of the kinds of enchantments they use. These things don’t just come out of thin air. They are embellishments of real fears, desires, and practices that existed historically. We also have physical evidence of magic other than katadesmoi like the use of poppets which are a staple of witchcraft.

Furthermore, Hekate is a goddess of witchcraft. Whether or not this was an original occupation of Hers is up for debate, but it must have been believed somewhere and sometime within the duration of Her worship in ancient society. There are plays and epic poems in which Hekate is directly mentioned as playing this part and being invoked in sorcery and magic that we would call witchcraft.

Lastly, to say that witchcraft is inherently impious opens up a threefold argument to me. The first point being that this statement is to adopt uncritically the social beliefs of a society that existed thousands of years ago. We do not live in the Ancient Greek world and our understanding of witchcraft and the Other has advanced signicantly. The second issue is that to say it is impious is to ignore the thousands of witches who do magic under the Theoi with the utmost respect, making transitional offerings, using traditional prayers and invocations, and who believe their power comes from the gods. As one of these witches, I believe in the concept of sympatheia and the idea that nothing happens that the Theoi do not permit. If the magic I use is effective and works, it is because the gods I have invoked and called upon to do my work have seen it as a just cause and have aided me in that work. No work I do is me claiming to have power over the gods or making them work for me. It is me calling on the aid of Hekate. But in all honesty witchcraft is perhaps always going to be feared and viewed as impious. And that’s okay with me. To really be a witch is to rebel and to be outside of the mainstream. If the witchcraft is palatable or mainstream, a large part of its power and authenticity is lost. So call me impious all you want, but I know that I love the Theoi and that my devotion to Hekate is unwavering and unquestionable. Finally though, I think there is a lot of valid criticism and issue with the way many witches, especially in Neo-pagan and Wiccan traditions, treat the Theoi and understand (or fail to understand) Their history or the practices surrounding Their traditional worship. This is a dissatisfaction I share and think needs to be addressed. But this is not a symptom of witchcraft as a whole, and witches who practice Hellenic Polytheism as a religion and are informed by Hellenic tradition within their magic are usually respectful and pious worshippers of the gods. The issue is not witchcraft, but the flimsy and almost neoliberal nature of many modern eclectic practices which do not have respect for the histories, contexts, or divinity of the gods they invoke.

Anyways. Witchcraft is a form of Ancient Greek magic. It is not inherently impious. And one can be a religious Hellenic polytheist and a witch without conflict.

i hate male entitlement, i hate male violence, i hate male aggression, i hate male weaponised incompetence, i hate male binary thinking, i hate male militarised thinking, i hate male arrogance, i hate male possessiveness, i hate male behaviour, i hate males but above all i hate the fact that i have to interact with males regularly, even when i make every attempt not to.

Things I did last semester that boosted my average:

I don’t really like to toot my own horn but I see these posts a lot and I thought I’d share what really worked for me personally :)

•took both handwritten and typed notes (minimized hand fatigue so my notes were actually good lol) (also it’s far easier to take extensive notes and delete them later than to take minimal notes and be stuck trying to remember what was said)

•before an exam: created flashcards, diagrams, and rewrote or fleshed out notes on a word doc in a simulated exam atmosphere to enhance later recall

•planned a month at a time so I knew in advance when I could socialize and when I had to Grind™️ to prevent burnout

•made friends in my classes!! genuinely makes a big difference

•annotated the hell out of everything (pencil or post in textbooks to resell, pen and highlighters in books I knew I’d keep, all online readings were converted to PDFS and I scribbled all over them)

•annotated with jokes this is maybe unorthodox but I swear it worked for me- I’d laugh at the wording, draw emojis, reference memes, and crack jokes in the margins of my books and it made it so much easier to remember key points of the readings later on

•cut off toxic friends. self explanatory lol but stress impacts your grades!