Ash Wednesday and Lent

     Growing up Southern Baptist, I never really was exposed to Ash Wednesday or Lent until I began attending a United Church of Christ church. Even then, it was somewhat non-traditional.

     Ash Wednesday is traditionally representative of the dust from which we are formed, a reminder that someday we will return to dust. The UCC church I attended when I first began practicing Lent held an additional interpretation. In their tradition, we were given pieces of paper in order to write down our fears, insecurities, and wrongdoings of the previous year, and they were placed in a bowl. At a specified time during the service, they were then lit. These were the ashes which were then crossed on the forehead. The idea was to burn away our fears and insecurities and start a new beginning during the period of Lent. 

     Lent traditionally represents the 40 days Jesus Christ spent in the desert before beginning his ministry. Fish is traditionally eaten on Fridays, and Sundays "don't count" and therefore the practitioner is allowed to indulge in whatever they are fasting from. 

     The Advent season leading up to Christmas (although I primarily focus on Yule) and the Lenten season leading up to Easter (although I'm still personally grappling with the meaning of Easter for myself, as I acknowledge Ostara moreso and Easter is solely a social/family gathering holiday for me) are the only real Christian holdover practices at this point in my life. So what do Ash Wednesday and Lent mean to me, a Unitarian-Universalist Pagan?

    I resonate well with my previous church's practice of utilizing Ash Wednesday to rid oneself of guilt and insecurities of the previous year. Most of us do so on secular New Year's Eve - or at least attempt to - but by Ash Wednesday we've fallen back to old habits and ways of thinking, as well as committed new mistakes which can lead to feelings of guilt. It's a reminder that forgiveness and letting go are continual processes and active choices from day to day, rather than something that is done once and it's over. Additionally, it's always a good idea to take a break from old habits and routines, and trying to engage in healthier ways of living. Lent provides a perfect framework for doing so - it's sandwiched between easy to remember start and end points (Ash Wednesday and Easter), works in "breaks" (Sundays) so that we can have realistic goals for ourselves and not give up at the first faltering, and allows for us to have a more spiritual mindset when doing so.

   Me, I'm working on using this time to read more, write more, and find ways to study and connect with the deities whom I feel most called to. Jesus may not be one of them any more, but I'm thankful for the groundwork that the best of his followers have laid for me. 

     

A Pagan Advent

Even though I identify at this point as Unitarian Universalist Pagan, with minimal Christian influence, I still enjoy the season of Advent and Christmas.

I think the reason it still appeals to me so much is because with winter, Depression sets in more strongly. Seasonal Affective Disorder  is in full force, with the sunlight being shorter and the weather being more melancholy. The music is generally positive and is a good symbol for awaiting the coming sunlight, even if it is referring to a demigod.

Advent is, of course, a Christian period of time leading up to Christmas, a Christian holiday. I still celebrate Christmas, although it is primarily cultural and my "family" holiday, whereas Yule has the more spiritual significance for me. However, Advent can be easily adapted as a time to prepare for the light of Yule. Currently, I still have the readings printed out from my days as a Gnostic, as well as readings from the Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship, which incorporates several different traditions - although I haven't been able to read them as much this year as I would like, due to my schedule. One thing I am considering for next year is making my own Advent weekly rituals incorporating common Yule themes and my chosen patrons.

Also, I'm making it a goal to write in this blog more often. I start a new job soon which I believe will make work/life balance much more feasible, and there are many things I want to start doing to practice balance.

Nothing Much to Say.

I haven't had time to write much of anything in forever. 

In March, I took an ethics class for my licensure process. At the same time, I attended the state NASW conference. There were some interesting topics, including one on LGBTQ+ issues and oppression. It's interesting how most of the trainings I go to regarding this topic, seem to basically have the same information as the presentation I gave, although altered for their particular style of presenting and focus. It gives me faith that I'm maybe actually good at something for a change.

For about a month, I was talking to another guy. Again, seems to have disappeared. I wonder sometimes if that's common in the LGBT community, or if I just have that effect on people. 

Work is overwhelming again. I'm exhausted all the time lately, and the to-do list never gets shorter, no matter how much I plug away. I'm just ready to get on with it. 

New Year

Well, 2017 pretty much went out with a bang.

The guy I mentioned in my previous post was pretty much a bust. Surprise, surprise. Such is life.

The presentation at work went great. I've been given the green light to basically try to get some LGBT-specific services at my work started, so I'm in the planning stages. First I made a rough draft of a survey to send to local LGBT-run agency, advocacy groups, etc, if I'm given permission to do so.  That will help determine demand, curriculum, and other finer details.

The week from Christmas Eve to New Year's was dramatic to say the least. My grandmother ended up in the hospital on Christmas Eve. Her heart basically just decided to stop working properly. No heart attack, no blockage, just not working. She has a pacemaker and is doing better. She was released from the hospital the day after Christmas.

The Friday after Christmas, my great-uncle's wife died. She was apparently in hospice, so this had probably been coming for a while. I'm not particularly close with that side of the family (even by my standards), so I don't know a lot of details.

On New Year's Eve, my grandfather's brother passed. Unlike my grandmother's brother's wife, this was not expected. I don't know a lot of details there either. Again, not all that close.

I've been trying to work more on engaging in hobbies I enjoy. Mainly reading and my spirituality. It comes and goes in phases, but I can feel the collective exhaustion and burn-out from work, so I have to try something.

Speaking of, I have a few ideas of upcoming topics for posts, so assuming I can make myself take the time to actually write, I'll be posting more frequently.

LGBT History Month

   Well. The past month has been a whirlwind to say the least.

    As noted in my previous post, I made a plan to put together some information to send to the head of our agency’s Cultural Diversity Committee. Sending that email then turned into her asking me to plan and provide a training on LGBT issues for the agency. I managed to put together over 60 slides worth of information into a powerpoint, including three slides of “further resources” such as worthwhile books, documentaries and websites, as well as seven slides worth of citing my sources. I was then told that the presentation will only be about 30 minutes long. So now I’m looking to see if I can still fit everything in that I want to talk about. The material I decided to cover is broken up into 4 parts:

•       Background information about LGBT History month – who started it and why
•         Definitions of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Cisgender - so that everyone is on the same page with what I’m talking about (the presentation will be to the whole agency, not just therapists, as I understand)
•        Important historical events – the meaning behind the rainbow flag, LGBT victims of the Holocaust, Stonewall, and changes in how it’s defined in mental health
•        Current  issues that LGBTs still face – substance abuse rates, intimate partner violence rates, homelessness rates, conversion therapy, family rejection, and others.

        I’m presenting it to the Cultural Diversity Committee this upcoming Thursday, and to the agency the following Thursday.

       Early in the month, as a bit of a preface, I sent out to the clinical department, the department which I’m a part of and therefore most likely to see LGBT clients, a mass email explaining a little about October being LGBT History month, and including PDFs of important LGBT figures, as well as a PDF I got from SAMHSA on substance abuse and the LGBT population. At the end of the week, our CEO approached me while I was washing a tea mug in the office kitchen, and asked me if I’d be interested in starting up some LGBT specific services. Of course, I said yes.  I don’t know if anything will come of it – this place is notorious for starting something and it dying off, or else planning something and it never happening.

     In other news, I came out to my birthfather this past Wednesday, 10/11, Coming Out Day. I did it through text because writing is easier for me, and also because with distance, who knows when I’ll see him in person again.  It went better than I could’ve imagined. He basically said that I’m his son, he loves me no matter what, and as long as I’m happy he doesn’t care who I’m with. He also said that if the rest of the family loves me, they’ll accept me for who I am, but if not, he’s there for me either way. I can’t even put into words how good that made me feel, to know I have at least one family member on my side – and on top of that, the family member that my family ostracized and kept me away from for 30 years.

     On top of all this, throughout September and October, I’ve been taking the approximately 4 hour drive from my town to a city on the other end of the state, every other weekend, for a class I need to complete as part of my social work licensing process. As much as I love the information, it’s been exhausting. However, in the process, there’s the slight possibility I’ve met someone who could be relationship potential. I’m taking things very slow, but we’ve been talking mostly regularly since we met, and seem to be compatible in most of the important areas. I’m trying not to get my hopes up, but I feel like I’m in an emotionally ready place in life to put myself out there, and dating can be difficult when you’re a bisexual man in a small town. I’ve had a few dates recently with different guys, but this is the first guy that I didn’t immediately think “No, this isn’t going to work” within the first 30 minutes of the date. So we’ll see. I’m just ready to settle down somewhere, with someone, and I’m tired of the overanalyzing, the overthinking, and all the other things that come with being introverted in the dating scene. We’ll see how things go.

Coming Back

     It's been awhile. As you've probably figured out, I have trouble with consistency. I tend to let myself get caught up in work and other responsibilities, and neglect self-care methods like writing my thoughts and reflections and engaging in other hobbies.

     I'm going to try to change that. As part of that change, I'm going to try to write in this blog at least a couple of times a month. I've come up with a list of topics I've been meaning to write about for a while, but just never have gotten around to. Interspersed with that will be my thoughts and reflections on current events, holidays, and other life events as I so feel led. So basically not much will change except I'm going to try to do it more often. Sometimes I feel like I need to write something because I'm feeling strongly about it, but when I actually get the time, I struggle to put it into words. But I guess that's when I need to do it the most, to remove my mental and spiritual blocks.

     The more things happen the last few months, the more I get tired of the bullshit. I've considered myself somewhat of an activist for years, but since Trump's election, especially with the recent events in Charlottesville, VA, I find myself becoming more restless and wanting to do more. I'm getting at that age to where I need to be my fully more authentic self so that I can practice what I preach to my clients. So I'm starting in small steps.

   October is LGBT History month. October was chosen because October 11th has already long been recognized as "Coming Out Day". As my place of employment's most outspoken and most vocal bisexual, I've decided that I'm going to put together a presentation of LGBT historical events and figures, the symbolism of the Pride Flag, overviews of mental health and substance abuse issues LGBTs face in comparison to the general population, and links to other resources, and present it to my company's (admittedly not very culturally diverse) Cultural Diversity Committee for them to distribute to the company as a whole. If they don't acknowledge me or follow through - which is a definite possibility, I'm going to just directly send it out myself, at least to my particular department (the ones most likely to be working with LGBT clients), if not the agency as a whole.  I'm tired of just sitting on the sidelines lamenting the cultural obstacles of where I live right now. I'm ready to act, even if some small way.

Speaking of acting and being my authentic self, I've decided that on - or at least by - Coming Out Day, I'm going to begin my process of coming out to my family. My obvious first step is my father. Since we're still getting to know each other, he's a "safe" person to come out to, I believe, as if he rejects me, well, it won't be anything different than the previous 30 years of my life before we first made contact. A test run, if you will. It also gives me time to prepare the best way. With him I'll obviously do it by phone, text, or email - he lives all the way in DC and so I don't even know when we'll see each other in person again because of finances, time, etc. But it's a little less clear with the rest of my family.

Well, we'll see how this goes. I know that I've talked about writing more often before. Let's see if it sticks this time.

Genealogy

I always thought that my previous connection to Celtic spirituality was, in large part, due to a past life connection to the Irish/Celtic world. More recently, I've come to believe that it's not only that, but also a connection to my current heritage.

A couple of months ago, I took a DNA test through AncestryDNA. I got the results back last week. They were interesting to say the least. It turns out I'm 98% European. No surprise there. What was a little surprising was the breakdown:
-30% Irish
-28% Scandinavian (Sweden, Norway, Denmark primarily)
-16% from the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal)
-11% Western European (Belgium, Germany, France, Netherlands, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein)
-5% Great Britain (England, Scotland, Wales)
-4% Eastern European (Poland, Austria, Russia, etc.)
-3% Italian/Greek
-around 1% European Jew

And the final 2% comes from the Caucasus region, which is around Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, etc. I guess this is where my Middle Eastern heritage comes in.

I'm surprised that there's no Native American in there, as one family legend was that one of my maternal ancestors was Cherokee. And I admittedly thought my Middle Eastern genetics would be higher, since in my younger, curly-haired college years, I had so many people asking if I were Jewish, and even had a Middle Eastern shop owner ask when I came to America from Israel. I also thought there would be more Scottish, as I always understood Moore (maternal grandmother) to be a Scottish name.

All of this has rekindled my interest in Celtic spirituality and confirmed that perhaps I need to revisit the Celtic deities I felt connected to. I wonder, at times, if perhaps my lack of connection to them over the years has been more due to my lack of balance and connection overall, as I tend to let life circumstances and anxieties take control. My goal now is to make some baby steps towards re-establishing balance.