Latest / Random Heathen Ramblings / Random Heathen Ramblings: S5, EP29 - A Lifetime In Heathenry (feat. Chris Waddell)

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Random Heathen Ramblings: S5, EP29 - A Lifetime In Heathenry (feat. Chris Waddell) · Random Heathen Ramblings

• 0:02
  Hello everyone, and welcome to the Random Heathen Ramblings
• 0:04
  podcast where we discuss all sorts of things Germanic
• 0:08
  Heathenry related. My name is Jesse and I am your
• 0:11
  host. Let's get into it.
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• 1:06
  All right, everybody, Halen, welcome back to this week's
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  some, some. All right, folks, whatever I was
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  So merchandise, social medias, everything, you can check it all
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  out. Another quick mention today, the
• 3:27
  time of the recording of this show, we, myself and some of the
• 3:32
  other event organizers for the annual Fire on the Mountain
• 3:37
  Spiritual Men's Retreat and Leadership Summit Invitational
• 3:41
  announced today the first of of several sponsors of the event.
• 3:48
  So of course Midgard Musings is, you know, myself and you know,
• 3:51
  we're going to be talking about this on future episodes of the
• 3:55
  podcast leading up to the event start this year, which is in
• 4:00
  October. So throughout this episode and
• 4:02
  future episodes, just so you guys are and gals are aware,
• 4:05
  you're going to be hearing some sponsored ads from those
• 4:08
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• 4:13
  whatever degree. So you're going to be hearing
• 4:18
  again from several of them throughout episodes.
• 4:20
  So when you see or hear the ads come through, just realize that
• 4:23
  these folks are sponsors of the event this year and helping fund
• 4:28
  the yeah, the, the, the, all of the things that go into hosting
• 4:33
  this event, you know, lodging and food and all that fun stuff.
• 4:38
  So today's episode is going to be really fun.
• 4:42
  We're going to have a gentleman coming on here in just a second
• 4:46
  to talk to us a bit about his lifetime in Heathenry.
• 4:50
  A lot of people who I talked to in heathen in Pagan communities
• 4:56
  have been practicing their, their faith or their, or this,
• 5:00
  this religion, you know, for a portion of their life.
• 5:03
  There's been very few people who I haven't come come in contact
• 5:06
  with who can honestly say it's been, you know, for as long as
• 5:09
  they can remember. You know, they are definitely
• 5:12
  out there, but it's a lot of folks even like myself, you
• 5:14
  know, came into this path from another way and, and being
• 5:18
  brought up in another sort of religion or, or lifestyle or or
• 5:21
  lack thereof. But, you know, Heathenry was
• 5:23
  something that came into their life or paganism was something
• 5:26
  that came into their life, you know, later on.
• 5:30
  But Chris is, is going to be joining us today and he is again
• 5:33
  a heathen of 50 plus years. Or is he's going to say, you
• 5:36
  know, for as long as he can remember.
• 5:39
  So I'm, I'm anxious to hear, you know, what it's been like for
• 5:41
  him as a, as a, as I understand, a somewhat solo practitioner for
• 5:45
  the most part. He does have some affiliations
• 5:48
  or connections or acquaintances with other, you know, Norse or
• 5:52
  Pagan groups out there. But we're going to hear more
• 5:55
  from him now and see what it's been like for him to be a
• 5:59
  heathen for his whole life up to including now.
• 6:02
  So without further ado, it's welcoming Chris to the show.
• 6:06
  Fire on the Mountain, an annual men's spiritual retreat and
• 6:10
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• 6:15
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• 6:42
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• 6:47
  for helping sponsor Fire on the Mountain.
• 6:52
  Thanks for having me. Hey man, how you doing?
• 6:55
  I'm, I'm all right, man. I I from the the technical
• 6:58
  hiccups that I was battling with before my.
• 7:00
  God, that's great. It happens.
• 7:01
  This is exactly. Heathen, it's a miracle I even
• 7:04
  made it on here. I'm completely lacking any kind
• 7:07
  of tech savvy. Well, you turn the machine on
• 7:11
  and and that's a start, right? You know, like.
• 7:14
  You got everything. Working, yeah, you can't make it
• 7:16
  with your hands or start it with a, with a, with a stick and a
• 7:18
  rock. And they think, well, what, what
• 7:20
  can these heathens possibly do, you know?
• 7:24
  But yeah, man, thank you for so much for, for reaching out and
• 7:27
  wanting to come on here and, and, and talk about, you know,
• 7:30
  your life as a heathen of over half a century, I guess now,
• 7:34
  right? Yeah, yeah, over half a century,
• 7:37
  as long as I can remember, even even before I even understood
• 7:42
  what I was doing. I was, you know, when I was a
• 7:45
  very small boy, I was leaving offerings.
• 7:48
  Have no idea why. Which I think is a big a big
• 7:53
  argument for what we inherit from our ancestors as far as our
• 7:59
  beliefs and, and, and what's in our DNA.
• 8:04
  Did so if you don't mind like give us a little bit of a
• 8:08
  background of your like you're obviously you're in the United
• 8:13
  States right So you're an American heathen and your your
• 8:17
  ancestry goes back to where, if you don't mind me asking that
• 8:20
  you know of. Scotland, somewhere in northern
• 8:25
  Germany, on my grandmother's side, father's side, Scotland,
• 8:30
  mother Irish and God only knows where else.
• 8:34
  I haven't looked really. You know, I haven't done any of
• 8:35
  those DNA checks or anything, anything like that.
• 8:38
  I just never thought I needed to, you know, I know you know
• 8:42
  who my gods are and and what my beliefs are certainly and just
• 8:46
  always had and you know, in the core of myself, you know, you
• 8:49
  just know what feels comfortable to you and and who and what you
• 8:52
  are on some level. Right, yeah, but so like how,
• 8:58
  how, how did it become a thing that you knew was was a way of
• 9:02
  of believing. You said you have recollections
• 9:05
  or memories from being a very small child and doing things
• 9:09
  that would for for someone with like, you know, the perspective
• 9:13
  of a Pagan or heathen would be like, oh, that's a real Pagan
• 9:15
  thing to do right. Leaving offerings.
• 9:17
  How did do you remember how that was integrated or or or became a
• 9:21
  part of your life? Was it a parent or or another
• 9:23
  relative that kind of guided you in that way or?
• 9:28
  Yeah, I think a lot of it came from my father, who was, he
• 9:31
  wasn't a Norse Pagan or a Germanic Pagan by any starts the
• 9:34
  imagination, but he was definitely a heathen on many
• 9:38
  levels. I don't know where I really got
• 9:43
  the idea to do some of the things that I used to do, but
• 9:49
  even at their earliest memories, I remember my grandparents would
• 9:52
  keep a little tin of saltine crackers for the kids to snack
• 9:56
  on. And there's a big oak tree
• 9:59
  behind their property. And for whatever reason, I would
• 10:01
  take saltines and I would leave offerings at that oak tree.
• 10:07
  But my father, even my father didn't use words like Vader or
• 10:11
  Vider have you want to pronounce it.
• 10:14
  He would just use terms like land spirits and spirits, but
• 10:18
  certainly respected those things that he knew instinctively that
• 10:22
  were out there. There was a spring where we
• 10:26
  would go to get water. A lot of people, it was right on
• 10:29
  the side of the road and people would just stop and fill up
• 10:33
  their water containers. It's still there today.
• 10:36
  People are still stopping there and filling up the water
• 10:38
  containers. But he would always leave
• 10:41
  something. He would leave an offering
• 10:43
  usually, and we'd put a coin in the dirt and then collect our
• 10:47
  water and sometimes make a wish. But I don't know where these
• 10:53
  beliefs even came from. And I don't think he even
• 10:55
  understood where these beliefs came from.
• 10:58
  But there's I, I, I swear there's that knowledge that's
• 11:01
  passed down even in your DNA. And, and, you know, we were
• 11:07
  just, I, I am particularly was just always practicing that.
• 11:11
  I mean, even before anybody told me to do those things.
• 11:15
  And, you know, eventually, little by little, you know, I
• 11:19
  started learning about the gods, and the Norse gods in particular
• 11:24
  just felt very comfortable and very much like home.
• 11:28
  You know, they felt like family from an early age.
• 11:30
  So, you know, it was only natural that, you know, it just
• 11:34
  sort of came into being and was always there.
• 11:37
  Yeah, no, it's interesting, like when you said, you know, you
• 11:41
  feel like you've always been heathen, but just didn't have
• 11:44
  like a name for it or know what to call it in, in the way that
• 11:50
  you describe. A little bit about your, your,
• 11:52
  your early days being near, you know, being, you know, out kind
• 11:58
  of in the, in the, in the countryside from the sounds of
• 12:01
  it, you know, there was creeks and there was a, a, a, you know,
• 12:04
  a, a spring to get water from. I mean that's, that's basically
• 12:07
  like the textbook definition of what the, you know, ancient pre
• 12:10
  Christian heathens of, you know, northern Europe.
• 12:13
  That's where they live. They lived outside of the, you
• 12:17
  know, in the heath as where, as I said, you know, so, you know,
• 12:21
  being like sort of country dweller, country bumpkin,
• 12:23
  whatever. Yeah.
• 12:26
  It's like that's what they were. They didn't have a name for it
• 12:28
  either. It was a name given to them
• 12:30
  later on. So yeah, I think that's an
• 12:33
  interesting thing to take away from as well.
• 12:37
  Yeah, we were. We were always very, very much
• 12:42
  always in the woods, always spending time, you know,
• 12:46
  outdoors. Even now, especially now, I
• 12:51
  just, there are certain times when I feel like I just got to
• 12:54
  get out of here. I live in a relatively populated
• 12:57
  area now. And sometimes you just feel like
• 13:00
  you need to get grounded again. And I just can't wait to get
• 13:05
  back into the woods, you know, into the fields, wherever.
• 13:12
  Yep, yeah, same for me. I live in Middle Tennessee and
• 13:17
  the city that I live in is is growing so much.
• 13:19
  It's it's, you know, they're they're they're tearing down
• 13:22
  natural spaces to make way for apartments and condos and
• 13:28
  townhomes. And it's like all of these
• 13:30
  natural spaces that you know, are, are, are they're
• 13:35
  diminishing. So I definitely get what you're
• 13:37
  saying about, you know, living in an area.
• 13:39
  And then you just I got to get away.
• 13:40
  I got to separate myself from this modernity and, and all the
• 13:45
  crap that goes with it and that you feel like so much better
• 13:50
  from being out there in nature and, and just the quiet, you
• 13:54
  know, listening to the sounds of nature and, and communing with,
• 13:57
  with the, the spirits of the land, the Veitier, as you said,
• 14:01
  in that way, it always feels better to do that way.
• 14:08
  And at an early age, I think it was more of a connection with
• 14:12
  the Vader, with the, with the land Vader.
• 14:17
  You always knew there was something there.
• 14:18
  You just felt like there was something there.
• 14:20
  And as I grew older, it's a little hard to describe, but I I
• 14:27
  swear I would catch glimpses of things and and see things.
• 14:33
  Yeah. And and still do, although it's
• 14:37
  getting harder and harder to stay in tune with everything
• 14:40
  when you're separated from it. So I try to get get reconnected
• 14:44
  as often as possible, but. Yeah.
• 14:48
  And I feel like my father was the same way, and he probably
• 14:50
  inherited it in the same way, but he would take us camping
• 14:54
  sometimes. I got in spur of the moment, he
• 14:56
  just said, you know, we're going out in the woods and, you know,
• 14:59
  he'd grab some blankets and and some food and we would just go
• 15:04
  out in the woods in the night and build a fire and and just
• 15:07
  spend time there. And, you know, I could feel the
• 15:12
  spirits tonight. The spirits are going to be with
• 15:13
  us tonight. So I think in that way he was
• 15:17
  very much connected to, even though, you know, he wasn't
• 15:21
  educated, book educated. He never read theaters.
• 15:24
  He never, you know, was educated in that sense.
• 15:29
  But somehow I think just in our DNA, an awful lot of us, we're
• 15:37
  still connected to those old ways and we're still connected
• 15:39
  to our ancestors in that way. Sure.
• 15:43
  Yeah, I feel like it's a it's a, a layer that we sometimes have
• 15:48
  to dig a bit to get to. But like you say, there, it's
• 15:52
  it's there. It's just how much we engage
• 15:55
  with certain things to bring it to the surface more and make it
• 16:00
  something that is active in our lives.
• 16:02
  You know, do you remember, like when you were little, you know,
• 16:08
  you said you would, you know, leave gifts or you had this
• 16:11
  sense of wanting to leave gifts? Like do you remember, you know,
• 16:16
  knowing why and, and, and like what the purpose of that was?
• 16:20
  You know, other than just, well, here's a cracker or here's
• 16:23
  anything like, do you remember having a sense of the reason and
• 16:25
  the purpose behind it at that age or in those early?
• 16:30
  In a way, the property that my grandparents owned, I think they
• 16:35
  have 9 acres that bordered a big forest.
• 16:39
  But at the back of their property there's an old oak.
• 16:44
  It's a really strange looking or excuse me, it looks almost like
• 16:51
  a turned up hand with the fingers growing up today I call
• 16:54
  it tears hand, but that tree is still there.
• 17:00
  And I just I remember thinking when I was younger that there
• 17:03
  was something there, you know what I mean?
• 17:05
  And that I was leaving those crackers, that offering for
• 17:10
  something that I just felt like was there.
• 17:13
  Can't explain why I thought that Nobody told me that.
• 17:17
  Yeah. I have no idea.
• 17:22
  I get, I get what you're saying and I think a lot of folks that
• 17:24
  are listening when they hear this and, and then watch it,
• 17:28
  we'll we'll understand too. Like it.
• 17:30
  I, I, I know what you mean when, when you say, you know, it's,
• 17:33
  it's kind of hard to explain because it, for a lot of folks
• 17:37
  that have either never experienced these types of
• 17:40
  things and don't have an idea or a sense, it's, it's like
• 17:42
  speaking Greek, you know, to, to somebody.
• 17:46
  They, they, they're like, Oh yeah, OK, just like nodding
• 17:48
  their head and going, uh huh. And not, and it's not really
• 17:51
  sinking in, but I definitely understand what it is you're
• 17:54
  saying. Knowing that there's something
• 17:56
  there that's bigger than you, that's, you know, whether you
• 18:00
  can see it physically or not, you just, it commands a presence
• 18:04
  and you know that they're there. And, and the desire to want to
• 18:08
  be respectful, knowing that we are coexisting with, with these
• 18:13
  spirits, with these unseen forces.
• 18:15
  You know, they, they are real. Just because they're not visible
• 18:19
  to the naked eye doesn't mean that they're less real.
• 18:22
  And but knowing that feeling, I think, like you say and have
• 18:25
  said several times already, it's it's kind of speaking to that
• 18:29
  deep rooted primal layer that is there all the time.
• 18:34
  Like it's been there, we've inherited it and it's, you know,
• 18:36
  just a matter of engaging and doing certain things like what
• 18:38
  you're talking about that really kind of awakened awakens that
• 18:43
  within us. And then we, we learn more about
• 18:45
  it, right? Because eventually, you know,
• 18:47
  you started doing that and it was just out of the genuineness
• 18:50
  of your heart and wanting to be respectful of the, of the
• 18:55
  spirits of the land. And then as you got older, it
• 18:59
  sounds like you started to do some research or look into
• 19:03
  things that like, well, what is this about, right?
• 19:07
  Would you care to elaborate more on how that kind of transpired
• 19:11
  and when, if you remember? I'm not going to put on my
• 19:14
  glasses. I wouldn't, but I'm going blind.
• 19:16
  I swear. Everything's blurry, so I'm just
• 19:17
  going to look like an old man. Don't.
• 19:20
  Feel bad man, join the club. Yeah.
• 19:25
  I mean, you know, I've always been a history buff, but, you
• 19:30
  know, I love history. But, you know, as I learned
• 19:32
  about and then, you know, I learned about a lot of
• 19:35
  mythology. I learned about Greek and Roman
• 19:37
  mythology, but when I touched on the Norse gods, it just felt
• 19:46
  very familiar. I felt like in a way I kind of
• 19:52
  already understood them. They just felt they've always
• 19:55
  felt very comfortable. Little by little as I started
• 20:03
  learning more about the Azer, they just sort of became family.
• 20:12
  To the point that I just can't. And there was a long period in
• 20:15
  my life when, you know, because before this current revival and
• 20:19
  there's a revival going on, there's a lot more people coming
• 20:22
  in. And I think a lot of it is due
• 20:26
  to a lot of movies and TV shows and that sort of thing.
• 20:29
  And I see these people coming in and, and a lot of them come and
• 20:33
  go. I've had a lot of people that
• 20:34
  were very serious and then we're gone in six months and moved on
• 20:41
  to something else. You know, you'd think they were
• 20:43
  the most spiritual and about people you'd ever met, and then
• 20:47
  suddenly they're not there anymore.
• 20:48
  So a lot of people are coming and going, but a lot of people
• 20:51
  that it hits a turn with are staying.
• 20:54
  And I think that's what it was like for me.
• 20:56
  It just felt right. It always felt right.
• 21:00
  And as the years progressed, it just got stronger and stronger.
• 21:05
  But for a long period of time when I didn't think there was
• 21:08
  anybody else out there, you know, before social media and
• 21:11
  everything else, and even after social media, because I didn't
• 21:14
  spend a lot of time on social media, I sort of felt like the
• 21:17
  lone Pagan. Yeah.
• 21:20
  There was just nobody to talk to about it, nobody to, you know,
• 21:26
  share it with. So you kind of kept it to
• 21:29
  yourself and didn't talk about it.
• 21:31
  And you know, I still retain my beliefs, but you know,
• 21:38
  eventually I started looking in the social media and everything
• 21:40
  else. I'm thinking, you know, holy
• 21:42
  shit, there's a lot more pagans out here than I thought.
• 21:47
  So I'm getting more fertile about it.
• 21:52
  You know, I have a very understanding wife who is, who
• 21:54
  is not a Norse Pagan, but she's a gift from the gods.
• 21:59
  I always say that, you know, cheaper granted to me by the
• 22:01
  gods I asked for and I got her. But the way I came into it was
• 22:11
  just instinctively, you know, you Start learning about the
• 22:16
  gods and and you know, before you know, and I mean, at one
• 22:20
  point even had an interaction with one of them that I forget.
• 22:27
  But now I feel very, very close and very connected to the gods.
• 22:32
  And that's something that you know, you just can't remove.
• 22:36
  Once it's there, you just can't remove it.
• 22:38
  It's never going to go away. Yeah.
• 22:42
  Fire on the Mountain, an annual men's spiritual retreat and
• 22:46
  leadership summit, is sponsored in part by Skogamore.
• 22:50
  From the foggy mountains of Appalachia comes forth this
• 22:53
  musical adventure from ex black metal musician Zeb Croom.
• 22:57
  Skogamore was first created in the fall of 2020 and is a mix of
• 23:02
  appellation and Nordic folk with dark ambient storytelling.
• 23:06
  Zeb has recently taken Skogamore out of the studio and onto the
• 23:10
  live stage, performing at different Nordic and Viking
• 23:13
  themed festivals around the southeast region of the United
• 23:16
  States. In addition to creating and
• 23:18
  performing his music, Zeb is also a Craftsman in homemade
• 23:22
  beard oils and animistic jewelry, incorporating natural
• 23:26
  wood and ethically sourced animal bones into beautiful and
• 23:29
  unique items to wear. Follow Skogamore on Facebook and
• 23:33
  Instagram to stay informed of new music and live performances.
• 23:38
  Thank you to Skogamore for helping sponsor Fire on the
• 23:41
  Mountain. So do you remember about how old
• 23:46
  it was that you were when you kind of took the direction of
• 23:49
  like wanting to learn more about it from like a, you know, the
• 23:52
  history, the academic side of things to to some extent, Was
• 23:55
  it, you know, grade school, middle school, high school?
• 23:58
  Do you have a recollection of roughly when that was?
• 24:03
  Yeah, probably my early teens. I, I think I bought a book.
• 24:06
  It was Myths of the Norsemen or something like that.
• 24:12
  I I still have the book, but I couldn't tell you what the title
• 24:14
  is, but I was probably maybe 1415 years old.
• 24:19
  Yeah, that's when I started actually learning the names.
• 24:22
  You know, I knew the basic names of some of the gods, you know,
• 24:26
  Thor and Odin, of course, and, and Pierre, but, and started
• 24:31
  learning more and reading more. And I think in a way I was
• 24:35
  blessed by not starting with books because you can get
• 24:44
  tangled up in books and, you know, if you find the gods
• 24:49
  instinctively rather than searching for them in books, I
• 24:52
  think you, you, you're at a big advantage because and it's
• 24:56
  harder that way and, and some people just can't connect that
• 24:59
  way. And, you know, I tell everybody
• 25:00
  connect in every way they can. But I think I was blessed in
• 25:03
  that way that, you know, I found that connection before I even
• 25:07
  found the books and. Yeah, yeah, you had the you had
• 25:12
  the thing that I talk about so much with in in different ways
• 25:17
  is the grass roots level of heathenry.
• 25:21
  And that's where it thrives. And I mean that in a lot of
• 25:23
  different ways. But it's the doing the
• 25:25
  applicable stuff, right? It's it's the performing the
• 25:29
  bloats when and, and as they're they were documented of, of when
• 25:33
  they were done and gathering with heathens together and doing
• 25:37
  some bowl and, and, and all of these various things that, you
• 25:39
  know, are talked about in some of the sources.
• 25:42
  But if all you're doing is reading about it and then
• 25:44
  researching it and then but not having an actual, you know,
• 25:48
  application of it, what are you really getting out of it other
• 25:51
  than just the knowledge of this this pretty cool thing or
• 25:55
  whatever? So, yeah, you got, you got kind
• 25:58
  of the the advantage of, you know, being born into a a family
• 26:02
  and then in a life that was natural for it to be that way.
• 26:05
  You adopted it early on without really knowing what it was.
• 26:11
  It would is just, it just came natural to you And and then you
• 26:14
  cultivated that as you got older and and found some of the more,
• 26:20
  you know, intricate details in the books, it seems.
• 26:22
  And do you think that that that helped you proceed in the
• 26:27
  direction that you that you went in?
• 26:30
  Like, do you think you're you're, and this may be a hard
• 26:33
  question to to answer, but do you think that had you not gone
• 26:37
  into the books and learned more about it that, that your path
• 26:39
  would have changed any? I don't, I don't think my path
• 26:44
  would have changed. I think it probably would have
• 26:49
  been a little different. I think I would still recognize
• 26:54
  that there were gods there. I just wouldn't be able to place
• 26:57
  the names or, you know, have names for them.
• 27:00
  And honestly, I don't, I don't care what you call them.
• 27:01
  You can totally change the names of the gods.
• 27:03
  The gods are still going to be there.
• 27:04
  And the gods are very real and they are very tangible.
• 27:12
  But yeah. And I don't knock anybody for
• 27:15
  reading those books and studying those books because it
• 27:17
  definitely gets you interested in in who the gods are.
• 27:23
  Yeah, it it definitely would have been different for me had I
• 27:26
  not, you know. Yeah.
• 27:29
  Started reading those books, started reading, you know,
• 27:32
  Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda and, and all those books.
• 27:37
  The mythology is fantastic. It's the stories are wonderful
• 27:41
  and they do help you get more connected to the gods,
• 27:44
  certainly. Absolutely.
• 27:46
  Yeah, and not just the gods too, right?
• 27:49
  I mean, like you, you, you talking to from a, a perspective
• 27:52
  of, you know, encountering the land spirits before you
• 27:57
  discovered the gods, you know, knowing that there's unseen
• 28:01
  forces that are not the gods of, of a pantheon per SE.
• 28:05
  They are the local spirits of that land that reside in your
• 28:09
  region or in your respective areas.
• 28:12
  Everywhere has them, you know, but, and then there's also like
• 28:17
  the, the traditions, you know, the cultural stuff, the things
• 28:22
  that were done in certain areas by certain people at certain
• 28:24
  times and for certain reasons and, and all of the various
• 28:28
  things that you, you, you know, you might be taught about it if
• 28:31
  you grew up in a very traditional household that that
• 28:34
  holds on to some of those, you know, folk traditions and
• 28:38
  things, you know, like a, you know, maybe a Swedish household
• 28:41
  or a Danish family or a Norwegian family or a German
• 28:44
  family or, you know, people that maybe had been exposed to like
• 28:49
  regional folk traditions that kept it alive through their
• 28:53
  family, you know, But again, without having anything like
• 28:56
  that, without having those real life experiences, the only way
• 29:00
  to like discover it is to like either, you know, you hear about
• 29:05
  it in a video or watch it on ATV show or listen to it on a
• 29:08
  podcast. And then maybe, you know, that
• 29:11
  that inspires people to go, well, where can I read more
• 29:13
  about this? Start, you know, researching it.
• 29:16
  And nowadays that's super easy because all you got to do is
• 29:18
  just go online and start typing in keywords.
• 29:21
  And I mean, there's, there's a plethora of information out
• 29:24
  there, some of which is kind of wacky.
• 29:26
  It doesn't really adhere to anything solid.
• 29:30
  A lot of, you know, a lot of people come on and with their
• 29:33
  own ideas about things and then try to pass them off as like,
• 29:35
  these are ancient traditional ways of doing things.
• 29:38
  And it's like, no, it's not. You know, you, you got a recipe
• 29:41
  from, you know, Reader's Digest 25 years ago and then you turned
• 29:45
  it into some sort of magical thing or whatever, you know what
• 29:48
  I mean? So like the, the books thing,
• 29:53
  you know, I've talked with people, academics especially,
• 29:55
  who are very into the reconstructionist approach, you
• 30:00
  know, being very being very authentic to what the source
• 30:06
  materials say. And it's interesting, you know,
• 30:11
  talking with folks like that. And I, you know, again, what it
• 30:13
  works for you, works for you. And if it doesn't work for you,
• 30:15
  then don't do it. I just think it's very
• 30:18
  interesting how you know, people, if they're too if, if
• 30:23
  their noses are too buried in the books, they don't, they
• 30:25
  don't see the forest in front of them where the books came from.
• 30:28
  You know, it's like you're missing all of this.
• 30:30
  They. Obsessed with, if they obsessed
• 30:32
  with recreating what somebody did, you know, 1000 years ago,
• 30:35
  1500 years ago, they're missing their experiences now.
• 30:43
  And I understand the, their point of view, the
• 30:46
  reconstructionist, but I, I think a lot of them are missing
• 30:49
  something. I think you need those personal
• 30:51
  experiences and I need, I think you need to find the gods on
• 30:57
  your own level, not on somebody else's level.
• 30:59
  Don't worry about what happened in the past.
• 31:01
  Don't worry about how people were performing bloats, you
• 31:04
  know, you know, 12113 hundred years ago, whatever.
• 31:12
  If everything I knew and understood in my core completely
• 31:19
  contradicted everything and every book I've ever read about
• 31:23
  the gods, I would still follow. And I would recommend anybody do
• 31:26
  that. Even if it totally contradicts
• 31:27
  everything you know that you've read and that you've studied,
• 31:34
  You need to stay true to what you found that you understand.
• 31:41
  And that doesn't warn me one bit.
• 31:43
  You know, I, I, I know what's real and what is it, you know,
• 31:46
  in my core. Yeah, yeah, you you have your
• 31:50
  reality, your. Truth.
• 31:53
  My beliefs aren't going to waver, and I think they're not
• 31:57
  going to waver because I found them honestly.
• 32:00
  And I think everybody needs to find those beliefs honestly and
• 32:03
  come by them honestly. The books are a great start to
• 32:07
  get you interested in and the mythology is fantastic and learn
• 32:10
  about the gods and everything else, but I still think people
• 32:14
  need to get out there and experience what's out there on
• 32:20
  their own and learn from those experiences and not focus so
• 32:26
  much on academics. Yeah.
• 32:30
  Why do you think, why do you think that?
• 32:33
  You know, I, I think that the with books and academia like
• 32:38
  that's again like that's one angle to take.
• 32:40
  That's one approach to take a person might be very
• 32:43
  academically inclined and, and, and that's their approach and
• 32:47
  that's the way they want to take it.
• 32:47
  But for a lot of folks that, you know, maybe you're coming into
• 32:51
  this new, you know, they're, they're, they're discovering
• 32:56
  that, you know, what they thought was just cosplay or
• 33:01
  dress up or, you know, Larping, you know, they're, they're
• 33:05
  discovering and they're learning at a point, right, That oh, wow,
• 33:08
  there's actually something real behind all of that, like the
• 33:10
  superficial aesthetic. There's something deeper behind
• 33:14
  all that, you know, why do you think that there was a, there
• 33:22
  was a, there's a thing I was thinking of that I was talking
• 33:25
  with somebody recently. But like, why do you think that
• 33:30
  people get so absorbed in the books and and and and and think
• 33:37
  that if they don't read it in a book, then they're doing it
• 33:40
  wrong? I don't know.
• 33:47
  Because I think, yeah, because I personally think that it that
• 33:50
  that probably comes from a lot of indoctrination from other
• 33:54
  experiences of their life through another religion maybe,
• 33:58
  or through just a lifestyle that they were brought up in, right?
• 34:00
  Because they they were told like, hey, if if this man says
• 34:03
  it right, the preacher, whatever, you know, or if this
• 34:05
  person is, it's in this book, then that's the way you got to
• 34:09
  do it. And I wonder if, if, if all of
• 34:11
  that type of mentality or, or that approach to things is, is
• 34:16
  hard to let go of and kept in the new approach to when they're
• 34:19
  discovering things like paganism, you know, 'cause
• 34:22
  there's really no, like we talk about source material, the Eddas
• 34:25
  and stuff, but they're not, it's not like a Bible.
• 34:28
  These aren't things that you're supposed to take literally and
• 34:31
  and use them as like a a book of instructions.
• 34:36
  You know, and I think that's the one great thing that separates
• 34:39
  us from the Abrahamic religions is the Abrahamic religions very
• 34:44
  much go to those texts as gospel that, you know, it, it was
• 34:50
  written. And so it must be we on the
• 34:55
  other hand, by and large and understand that it is mythology.
• 35:03
  I think it's a little it's a little bit different.
• 35:05
  I think especially people that were brought up in Christian
• 35:07
  households. And I see exactly what you're
• 35:09
  saying is, you know, the majority of people, especially
• 35:13
  in this country, have been practicing Christianity for
• 35:16
  generations and generations and generations.
• 35:19
  So I think it's hard to break away from that rigid mold of
• 35:25
  following. There's text and what was
• 35:29
  written and the rules. There's a lot of rules.
• 35:32
  And I think we just get too absorbed in following those
• 35:34
  rules. And I think that it's kind of a
• 35:38
  block for a lot of people that they can't just let go of it
• 35:40
  and, you know, follow their own personal experiences.
• 35:47
  But yeah, you know, it's, it's kind of a handicap in a way.
• 35:52
  But I think you're right. I think I think being brought up
• 35:56
  with that for so long has sort of shackled a lot of people in
• 36:01
  the breaking away and and finding what's real.
• 36:06
  I also, I also wonder if 'cause we mentioned it or you mentioned
• 36:09
  it earlier on, I think that, you know, you, you said you saw a
• 36:14
  lot of people come into Heathenry and then, you know, in
• 36:19
  less than a year they're gone. They lost interest.
• 36:24
  But at the beginning they were like super gung ho and they were
• 36:27
  really seemingly deep into it and devoted to it.
• 36:31
  And then they lost that and went on to something else.
• 36:35
  Yeah. You know, I wonder if it's a
• 36:38
  combination of why that happens, like a combination of everything
• 36:42
  that we're talking about. It wasn't something that was a
• 36:46
  deeply rooted pull. You know, they they weren't
• 36:50
  pulled in the direction organically through, I think you
• 36:53
  mentioned like DNA or ancestors. There's that.
• 36:57
  And then I also wonder if it has to do with the fact that they
• 37:01
  couldn't find anything equal to maybe something that they had
• 37:06
  been brought up and like nothing definitive of a book or
• 37:09
  something that gives them just just tell me how to do it.
• 37:11
  And that's the way we're gonna do it.
• 37:14
  There's, there's so much variances and there, and there's
• 37:17
  so many different things, you know, depending on who you talk
• 37:20
  to, you know, there is no universal way of being a
• 37:24
  heathen. There's, there's different
• 37:26
  approaches and there's different ways.
• 37:27
  And I wonder if that in itself can deter a lot of people 'cause
• 37:32
  they feel like, well, what do I have to go off of?
• 37:35
  And they don't have that connection with their ancestors
• 37:37
  and doing anything. And, you know, boots on the
• 37:40
  ground, getting out there and connecting to nature and, and
• 37:43
  finding the gods themselves. I wonder if that's the reason
• 37:47
  why they they kind of go off the off the rails a bit.
• 37:51
  What do you think? Yeah, you know, that's logical.
• 37:54
  I mean, it's definitely possible.
• 38:01
  I had a friend, actually, I was on there.
• 38:06
  We, there was a, it was a heathen social app that was up
• 38:10
  for a while. And I had met him through that
• 38:12
  social app. And you know, I'm on the
• 38:16
  southeast coast of Delaware. He's in middle Delaware.
• 38:19
  And you know, we got to talk and he's like, hey, come on up,
• 38:21
  there's a meter right here. We'll stop and have a meet.
• 38:24
  And he he was very, very serious, you know, it, it
• 38:32
  started getting, you know, Viking tattoos and reading all
• 38:38
  the books and, and he got tickets to Vikings Khan, which I
• 38:45
  didn't want to go because it was a LARPAR event and it prevents
• 38:49
  driving nuts. But he's saying, well, you know,
• 38:53
  you know what I'm saying, you get there.
• 38:56
  They look like they live in their mom's basement.
• 38:58
  They got, yeah, two Chinese made Viking swords on their back and,
• 39:02
  and what they call a Viking haircut and.
• 39:06
  Yeah. How many skulls and how many
• 39:08
  till Valhalla's do you get before you know within an hour?
• 39:12
  Yeah, Stall. Yeah, yeah, you get a lot of
• 39:15
  that but you know, I went anyway, but it seemed very
• 39:19
  serious and and I was having some problems and with my family
• 39:24
  and. And I told him I, I went
• 39:26
  because, you know, I appealed the tier to help me out, you
• 39:30
  know, help me through this and, and find a fair solution and,
• 39:35
  and, and give me wisdom to the solution that, you know, it's a
• 39:38
  problem that I needed to solve. And I felt like tier really
• 39:40
  helped get me through it. And so I would to get a tattoo
• 39:44
  to honor tier and and intimately I did, you know, and you know,
• 39:52
  he talked about how great it was that I was, you know, I'm glad
• 39:55
  you found, you know, help through the gods and and
• 39:58
  everything else. And, you know, he was so
• 40:00
  ecstatic about that. And then all of a sudden he
• 40:05
  just, you know, stopped talking about it sort of faded off in
• 40:12
  oblivion. And I haven't bothered him
• 40:14
  because, you know, I've seen so many people do that.
• 40:17
  But I don't want to pester him. You know, I don't want to
• 40:19
  pressure anybody. I don't want to say, you know,
• 40:21
  hey, come back. You know, you don't give up on
• 40:25
  the, you know, I want everybody to find their own way.
• 40:27
  So I don't want to pressure anybody.
• 40:30
  But I've seen it happen like that so many times that you just
• 40:34
  sort of get numb to it. You're like, OK, you know, here
• 40:37
  comes another one. But occasionally people do get
• 40:42
  rooted and, and they do find that, you know, there's, there's
• 40:47
  a lot of truth and, and what we believe and what we practice.
• 40:51
  And I think once they find that truth, it, there's so much of an
• 40:57
  it, it's such an undeniable truth and it's so natural and
• 40:59
  it's so I, I don't even have it. It's hard to find the words to
• 41:05
  describe what I'm trying to say. I'm not very good with words.
• 41:08
  The organic part of it, you know it's going to say it's just it's
• 41:11
  not forced. It's not something that you have
• 41:14
  to try to make happen. It just it happens by itself
• 41:18
  with a little bit of guidance, you know?
• 41:23
  Yeah, I've, you know, I've been heathen now for almost 10 years.
• 41:29
  And, you know, being on social media that whole time, getting
• 41:37
  acquainted with certain folks and then, you know, a year or
• 41:42
  so, whatever goes by and it's like where they at, you know,
• 41:46
  what are they doing? And it's they, you know, they,
• 41:49
  they kind of fell off. And I've talked to people too.
• 41:55
  You know, I have a very good friend of mine, I who somebody
• 41:58
  who I consider brother, you know, and I don't bestow titles
• 42:00
  of kinship on other people all Willy nilly.
• 42:04
  I'm not one of these people that, you know, joins a quote UN
• 42:07
  quote Norse Viking group on Facebook and then it's hey,
• 42:10
  brother, hey sister, I'm like, Nah, you know, that doesn't that
• 42:13
  doesn't, I don't, I don't go like that.
• 42:17
  But this person I'm talking about, he's he's a friend of
• 42:20
  mine. He's and we've exchanged and
• 42:22
  we've done enough things together that you know, there's
• 42:25
  this trust established and now, you know, we are not blood
• 42:30
  related, but we are brothers. And you know, me and him have
• 42:33
  talked. He's been on this podcast
• 42:35
  several times about, you know, that that feeling of kind of say
• 42:42
  burnout, but like where you don't feel like you're, you
• 42:50
  know, connected to the gods or, or to your ancestors or
• 42:55
  whatever, Like you feel just kind of disconnected from
• 42:58
  things. And then what do you do to
• 43:00
  reconnect? And I was, I was wanting to kind
• 43:02
  of talk to you about that, you know, as, as being someone who
• 43:06
  has spent your whole life in this path and having not
• 43:09
  deviated or, or found anything else that took your attention
• 43:12
  away, you know, would you have any suggestions or, or maybe
• 43:16
  some advice for people who might be feeling like, man, I was, I
• 43:21
  was pulled in this direction. I I want to stay here, but
• 43:23
  there's just, you know, I'm, I'm unsure or it doesn't feel like
• 43:27
  it once was, you know, maybe the like the the honeymoon phase is
• 43:30
  gone. You know what I mean?
• 43:32
  Like what would you maybe in part suggest to to, to be might
• 43:37
  be, you know, struggling with something like that?
• 43:41
  Yeah, yeah. I felt disconnected myself, you
• 43:44
  know, more than once. Disconnected with, you know,
• 43:47
  with the gods, with everything. You know, when it happens, I
• 43:51
  mean, for me, you know, I try to get grounded again.
• 43:57
  I try to spend some time away from the hustle and bustle of
• 44:02
  regular life and just get out in the woods, get out on the water,
• 44:06
  you know, get out there in nature, among the gods and among
• 44:09
  the Vader. Sometimes I, I even take, you
• 44:13
  know, more drastic approaches. And it's a little controversial,
• 44:16
  but, you know, Silas Ivan. I.
• 44:21
  I mean, two or three times a year there for a while, it
• 44:28
  really clears out the cobwebs. It really removes all the junk
• 44:35
  and shows you the truth of, of what there is out there.
• 44:38
  And, and when that cobweb is in, when all those cobwebs are
• 44:42
  removed and you see things clearly as they really are, you
• 44:46
  know, the next day, you know, I'm, I'm focusing clear again.
• 44:48
  I'm more connected again. And, and I'm sure that's not the
• 44:51
  other way to do it. And I've said for years, I hope
• 44:54
  that someday I will come to a point where I don't need to do
• 44:56
  that. But I'll be honest with you,
• 44:58
  sometimes I do need to do that. And I, I have done that, you
• 45:01
  know, over the years. I mean, you know, there's been
• 45:04
  several years that I don't need to.
• 45:08
  Yeah. But you know, when I need to
• 45:11
  like, you know, OK, I got, I got to, I got to get a reset and and
• 45:15
  that's what to do. Yeah, yeah.
• 45:19
  And just, you know, for the sake of folks that listen to this
• 45:21
  show that are maybe new or, or anything like that, you know,
• 45:25
  when we talk about plant medicine, whether it's
• 45:30
  psilocybin or, or, or cannabis or any other sort of, you know,
• 45:33
  plant based medication, 'cause I, I, I see, I see this as
• 45:40
  medicine. It is, it is medicine, it's
• 45:42
  medicinal and it's, and it's been proven countless times by
• 45:47
  people way smarter than me that it, it is beneficial to so many
• 45:52
  different things. The mind, the, the, the, the,
• 45:56
  the cells reconstructing, rebuilding cells.
• 45:59
  And just, I mean, it's phenomenal what this substance
• 46:03
  can do. We're talking about, you know,
• 46:05
  mushrooms. But I do just want to kind of as
• 46:08
  a disclaimer for folks that listen and watch this or
• 46:10
  whatever, it's like, hey, we're not, we're not sitting here
• 46:11
  advocating like if you need help, then like go out into the
• 46:14
  woods and, and, and trip on some mushrooms and you'll be OK.
• 46:18
  Like, no, that's not what we're saying here.
• 46:22
  It's. Not absolutely does not work for
• 46:26
  it, but, but for me, yeah, I, I think there are a lot of things
• 46:34
  out there. And, and like I said, if you can
• 46:36
  do it naturally without any help, and you know, the best
• 46:40
  way, honestly, I, I honestly believe spend some time in
• 46:43
  nature, spend some time out among the gods, erase, sit out
• 46:50
  there, take some deep breaths, erase any thoughts from your
• 46:54
  head, any internal dialogue and just breathe.
• 46:57
  And more often than not, you can reconnect.
• 47:01
  Sometimes you need a hard reconnect.
• 47:03
  I know I do sometimes. And that's what helps me.
• 47:06
  I'm not saying it's for everybody, but the important
• 47:11
  thing is to get grounded and, you know, realize that there are
• 47:17
  so many entanglements that we wrap ourselves in, in, in daily
• 47:21
  life and so many things that we worry about that really we don't
• 47:26
  even really need to worry about. If you're alive, your breathing,
• 47:32
  you're going to be fine. And I think if you can just take
• 47:35
  a deep breath and realize that and erase all that, you'll
• 47:40
  reconnect. I think you'll reconnect with
• 47:42
  yourself to reconnect with the gods.
• 47:45
  That's the best advice I can give.
• 47:46
  If you need help and you have, you know, some sort of plant
• 47:49
  medication, you know, some sort of natural way of doing that,
• 47:53
  sometimes that helps. Yeah, man, I, no, I think it's,
• 48:01
  it's, it's something to, to key in on that, you know, connect,
• 48:05
  you know, you say get grounded, you know, connect to nature And
• 48:07
  that, you know, for, for folks that don't know, there is so
• 48:12
  much good that can happen physically and emotionally to a
• 48:16
  person that, you know, gets their bare skin, their bare feet
• 48:23
  on the earth on the ground. Also, something that has been,
• 48:28
  you know, scientifically proven to be beneficial is to get your
• 48:32
  bare skin and touch earth, touch grass, you know, even if it's
• 48:37
  for, you know, 10 or 15 minutes a day, you know, whatever you
• 48:41
  can do and you can find ground. You can find earth anywhere,
• 48:45
  even if you live kind of in a residential neighborhood or, or
• 48:48
  whatever. There's, there's, there's parks,
• 48:50
  there's, there's plots of grass, there's earth anywhere.
• 48:53
  You know, even if you have to take a little bit of a drive, if
• 48:55
  you live like in the inner city or something, stuff like that
• 49:00
  can really help with the reset process in a softer, sort of
• 49:04
  gentler way than going down like a, you know, a psilocybin route
• 49:09
  or whatever. Because that can be a pretty
• 49:10
  that can be, like you say, a hard reset necessarily.
• 49:13
  Yeah, I'm not recommending everybody go out and and, you
• 49:15
  know, buy mushrooms and and sit out on your back porch.
• 49:20
  You absolutely do not want to approach it that way, and I
• 49:22
  don't recommend that you do. Fire on the Mountain, an annual
• 49:27
  men's spiritual retreat and leadership summit, is sponsored
• 49:31
  in part by the Norse Fox Creations.
• 49:34
  The Norse Fox Creations is a small business that prides
• 49:37
  themselves in crafting Viking era inspired items.
• 49:41
  All materials are naturally sourced, handmade and crafted
• 49:45
  with the greatest detail in keeping in period, but with a
• 49:48
  modern day touch. They bring to their customers
• 49:51
  the heart and soul of the Viking era community with each of their
• 49:55
  one-of-a-kind pieces. From horn, hide, bone and bag,
• 50:00
  they have items for the novice to the more seasoned garb
• 50:03
  enthusiast. Visit them on Facebook at the
• 50:06
  Norse Fox Creations and e-mail them for Commission work at the
• 50:10
  Norse Fox creations@gmail.com. Thank you to the Norse Fox
• 50:15
  Creations for helping sponsor Fire on the Mountain.
• 50:20
  But like you say, there's plenty of, you know, and if you, you
• 50:23
  just need to take an hour drive to get somewhere where you can
• 50:26
  be away from, you know, the city or, or wherever you are and just
• 50:30
  get back out and get grounded. Like you say, get grounded.
• 50:36
  Energy is a funny thing. We're all made of the same
• 50:38
  energy. You know, the earth is made of
• 50:39
  the same energy. The trees are made of the same
• 50:41
  energy. We're made of the same energy.
• 50:43
  So in that respect, we're all cosmically connected with
• 50:49
  everything around us. You know, even human beings, we
• 50:53
  all share a common maternal grandmother.
• 50:56
  We're all cosmically connected. And and beyond that, we're all
• 51:00
  connected to everything else, the trees, the earth, the water
• 51:03
  by energy. We're all made of that same
• 51:05
  energy. And I firmly believe that.
• 51:06
  And if you connect with that and allow yourself to connect with
• 51:10
  that and drown everything else out, just just tune it out and
• 51:14
  reconnect with that energy, I think you'll be fine.
• 51:18
  Yeah, yeah. And what's interesting is that
• 51:22
  when you do connect to like when you, when you close all that
• 51:25
  out, when you, when you kind of turn off those external noises
• 51:28
  and troubles and, and, and stuff, and you get to a place
• 51:31
  where you can just breathe and, and, and, and it's quiet.
• 51:33
  And like you say, you know, connect back to yourself.
• 51:37
  There is that we are sacred. You know, there is divinity
• 51:40
  within us that I feel like, you know, when, when, when that
• 51:43
  happens, when we are back in nature and, and there are we,
• 51:49
  we're given the opportunity to kind of get involved with all of
• 51:53
  this old energy. We realize that we are all
• 51:58
  connected in this way and how, how much greater of a, of a way
• 52:02
  of connecting to the gods than to realize the God within us
• 52:09
  all, you know, the, the, that, that divine nature, that divine
• 52:12
  breath, that the, you know, all of these, these things that were
• 52:15
  gifts from the gods to mankind. You know, it's all there.
• 52:21
  And I think once that happens, it, it, it does, it allows us
• 52:25
  to, you know, reconnect with that feeling of divinity that we
• 52:32
  look outside for so much. You know, people think all the
• 52:35
  gods are there. The gods are here.
• 52:36
  The gods are there, man. Well, what about what's going on
• 52:39
  here? You know gods.
• 52:40
  Are inside us. Absolutely.
• 52:43
  Absolutely. And I think that's part of what
• 52:46
  we're talking about with how, you know, you as a young child
• 52:49
  knew what you were doing, didn't know why you were doing it maybe
• 52:52
  at the time or, or, or knew the why.
• 52:55
  But in a, in a way that was very primal, very basic, you know,
• 52:59
  knowing that there's something there that needed to and, you
• 53:02
  know, demanded respect or not, just like they demanded, but,
• 53:04
  you know, garnered respect, you know, and that you wanted to be
• 53:08
  kind of benevolent to it. But you know, that again,
• 53:14
  that's, that's something from within, that's something that
• 53:16
  gets passed down, something that gets handed down.
• 53:20
  You know, I had somebody, a young child or say a young, a
• 53:24
  young person recently ask me about how do they connect with
• 53:33
  their ancestors? What are ways for them to
• 53:37
  connect with their ancestors 'cause they really didn't have a
• 53:43
  lot of knowledge about their specific lineage.
• 53:46
  You know, they really didn't know too much about that to, to
• 53:50
  be able to specifically say, yeah, let me, you know, Grandpa
• 53:54
  Joe and Grandma Jane or whatever, you know.
• 53:57
  And so they were like genuinely asking you, how do I connect
• 54:01
  with my ancestors? Do you have any experience or,
• 54:06
  or, or insight as to, you know, what you would tell somebody who
• 54:10
  asked a question like that to you?
• 54:12
  Well. You know, I, I know my ancestors
• 54:17
  back, you know, a few generations at least back to my
• 54:20
  great grandparents. So it's hard for me to say from
• 54:23
  a personal standpoint, but I would think if you just, you
• 54:28
  know, sit down and, and, you know, ask internally, you know,
• 54:33
  to connect with your ancestors. I mean, even on that level, even
• 54:36
  to just say, you know, you know, great grandmother, grandfather,
• 54:43
  great grandfather, you know, I, I'd like to sit and talk with
• 54:47
  you and, and, you know, honor you and and, you know, welcome
• 54:54
  you into my home. Yeah, I think that would be a
• 54:57
  big help. I mean, even if you don't know
• 54:59
  who they are, even if you honor them, You know, before this
• 55:01
  podcast, I went in and and made an offering to my father, who's
• 55:05
  dead and, you know, poured in my glass of Scotch and said, you
• 55:12
  know, keep an eye on me, make sure I don't act like an ass.
• 55:14
  Then I made an offering to Odin and more or less ask the same
• 55:17
  thing. But I think if we try to
• 55:20
  connect, you know, with our ancestors in that way, even if
• 55:24
  you don't know who your ancestors are, that symbolic
• 55:29
  gesture of saying, you know, I acknowledge that you're there
• 55:34
  and, you know, hope that you're here with me.
• 55:36
  I think I, I think it would be a big help.
• 55:38
  I think it's a great way to connect even if you can't
• 55:43
  picture them or know them or, or see their faces.
• 55:48
  I think, I think anything would help.
• 55:50
  I think anything helps you connect your ancestors.
• 55:52
  And like I said, I think you're, you're connected to your
• 55:54
  ancestors no matter what. I think your DNA was passed down
• 55:59
  by them and there are sermons that's passed down to us and I
• 56:03
  think even science is starting to back that up.
• 56:06
  There was a university study with mice.
• 56:09
  I forget the details, but apparently mice really like
• 56:12
  cherries to put cherries in this maze and they'll have the mice
• 56:17
  come out and eat the cherries and then they would shock the
• 56:20
  mice and eventually the mice realized they would set off an
• 56:25
  alarm or something before they shocked the mice.
• 56:29
  Then they allowed those mice to have offspring.
• 56:32
  Then they allowed their offspring to have offspring.
• 56:35
  And then they did the same experiment.
• 56:36
  They put the cherries out, they set off the alarm and those mice
• 56:40
  that had never suffered that electric shock or dealt with
• 56:44
  that, you know, hit because somehow passed on to them that
• 56:50
  they associated that with danger.
• 56:52
  So I think there's a lot passed down energetically and, you
• 56:56
  know, science is even starting to back that up.
• 56:59
  So I wonder how much has been passed down to us for God only
• 57:04
  knows how long. But I think it's very real.
• 57:09
  I think you can connect with your ancestors even if you can't
• 57:11
  see them, if you, even if you didn't know them, you know, if
• 57:15
  you try to find a way and reach out to them, I think you can do
• 57:18
  it. You.
• 57:21
  Wanna have something interesting?
• 57:23
  You know this is the first time folks listen.
• 57:25
  They're listening to the show, right?
• 57:26
  This is the first time Chris and I have exchanged emails back and
• 57:29
  forth for a little while, but it's only just been to
• 57:32
  coordinate dates and times and, you know, subject matter for the
• 57:38
  show. But we have not talked about
• 57:39
  this topic or anything else other than what's happening
• 57:42
  right now in real time, OK. And I told you right now that I
• 57:46
  said I had somebody asked me recently and at the time of this
• 57:50
  recording recently means, you know, yesterday.
• 57:53
  So by the time the people hear this, you know, Sunday, July
• 57:57
  14th, when I was asked that question, the, the answer that I
• 58:04
  gave Chris was almost identical to what you said.
• 58:08
  I told them that just because you don't know your ancestors by
• 58:12
  name doesn't first of all mean that they don't exist, number
• 58:17
  one. And #2 your ancestors know who
• 58:20
  you are, your immediate ancestors.
• 58:24
  And so even if all you did was to call that in that way, you
• 58:28
  know, ancestors or I you, you mentioned something, you know,
• 58:31
  great grandmother, great grandfather or grandfather, I
• 58:34
  said, you know, that's a, that's something that can encompass a
• 58:37
  long lineage, a long line of ancestors, you know, and that's
• 58:41
  seen in different cultures too. You know, you, you call the
• 58:44
  elder ancestors, you know, grandmother or grandfather, that
• 58:48
  sort of thing, you know, so you can, you can use that title and,
• 58:52
  and whether you have a specific ancestor or not, you know, in
• 58:55
  mind, that is, that is directing your intention, your to, to them
• 59:01
  and they'll hear you because they want to be a part of your
• 59:04
  life. They're, you know, they're
• 59:05
  connected through the oar log that, that, that primal layer
• 59:09
  of, of things getting passed down to people.
• 59:12
  And I just, I think it's very interesting that, you know, I
• 59:14
  asked you that question and the answer that you gave was almost
• 59:17
  identical to the answer that I gave to this person.
• 59:20
  And we haven't talked about this.
• 59:21
  We didn't orchestrate this, We didn't script this.
• 59:23
  No, we. We barely spoken except for you,
• 59:26
  like you say, some e-mail exchanges and and.
• 59:28
  Yeah. Setting up details for.
• 59:31
  So that's an interesting thing to take away from this whole
• 59:34
  thing right now is, you know, when you've got two different
• 59:36
  people on, you know, two different time zones and, and
• 59:40
  states between one another. And, you know, a, a, a subject
• 59:45
  that would come up in in conversation almost gets a, a
• 59:49
  very identical, similar to almost identical response in, in
• 59:53
  answer to that question. And the second part of that
• 59:58
  question I was, I was going to throw your way, Chris, was that
• 1:00:00
  this is the second thing they asked is how will I know that my
• 1:00:06
  ancestors have heard me, you know, or, or how I know that
• 1:00:12
  they, you know, that I got through to them or something
• 1:00:16
  like that. I can't answer that.
• 1:00:25
  Me personally, I would just assume I can't give you an
• 1:00:30
  answer there. I I don't know how you could
• 1:00:32
  possibly know. So what I told them was I
• 1:00:38
  couldn't, I, I, you know, in a way there was a part of the
• 1:00:41
  answer that I gave that was close to that because I said,
• 1:00:43
  you know, I can't tell you how your ancestors are going to
• 1:00:47
  connect to you. I know how my ancestors connect
• 1:00:50
  with me. However, when your ancestors
• 1:00:54
  connect with you, you're going to know it's going to, if
• 1:00:56
  there's something's going to happen, there's going to be some
• 1:01:00
  sort of a response that is meant for you to know that they
• 1:01:03
  connect with you. And you're not going to have any
• 1:01:04
  doubt in your mind when that happens.
• 1:01:06
  Whatever it is, however it's done, it'll happen and you'll
• 1:01:09
  know. It might not be a big boom crack
• 1:01:11
  from the sky. Hey, Chris, it's me, your
• 1:01:14
  grandfather, or anything like that.
• 1:01:18
  It could just be a simple whisper, a knock what, you know
• 1:01:21
  what I mean? Like it could be something so
• 1:01:22
  subtle that to any what at any other point in time or any other
• 1:01:27
  occurrence of things would be seemingly insignificant.
• 1:01:30
  But in the moment of you being aware and and present, you're
• 1:01:36
  going to know because it's meant for them to know.
• 1:01:38
  It's meant for you to receive. Yeah.
• 1:01:41
  You know. Yeah, and I and I honestly
• 1:01:44
  believe that your ancestors are connected to you.
• 1:01:47
  And and if you do reach out to them, absolutely, we're going to
• 1:01:49
  know you're reached out to them. Yeah, I firmly believe that.
• 1:01:56
  They are such a big part of our lives that I don't, you know, a
• 1:02:01
  lot of folks, heathens that I've spoken to, you know, put so much
• 1:02:05
  attention on the gods and, and even the Veitier, the spirits of
• 1:02:09
  the land and all that. And yes, those are important
• 1:02:11
  elements. But have you, have you
• 1:02:12
  remembered your ancestors? Have you realized that you
• 1:02:16
  wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them, you know?
• 1:02:20
  And you carry a part of those ancestors with you.
• 1:02:23
  Absolutely your ancestors are with you.
• 1:02:25
  But you know you have no choice over that.
• 1:02:28
  Absolutely. Your ancestors are part of you,
• 1:02:31
  energetically and spiritually. Yeah.
• 1:02:36
  You know, so I almost I almost encourage folks that are
• 1:02:42
  specially getting into this that are new to like kind of
• 1:02:45
  newcomers to Heath and Ree is they they want to put all their
• 1:02:49
  focus on the divine, on the gods right up front.
• 1:02:54
  Kind of like what you were saying before about coming into
• 1:02:57
  this, like having it become or having it be a natural thing
• 1:03:01
  and, and, and finding them your own way instead of finding them
• 1:03:04
  in a book or or finding them how somebody else found them.
• 1:03:08
  I, I, I strongly encourage, especially newcomers is, you
• 1:03:12
  know, before you get into the importance of the gods and
• 1:03:15
  everything out like that is if you first found your aunt, like
• 1:03:20
  the, the connection with your ancestors that's always there.
• 1:03:22
  It might just be kind of recessed or hasn't been, You
• 1:03:25
  haven't been tending to that fire, you know, 'cause it, it's,
• 1:03:27
  it's a new approach, right? Ancestral worship, ancestral
• 1:03:30
  veneration is, is, is something very unique to paganism,
• 1:03:35
  Heathenry. It's not really something you
• 1:03:37
  see in like the Abraham Abrahamic, especially
• 1:03:39
  Christianity religions. There's not a real focus on
• 1:03:42
  that. So it's a new concept to a lot
• 1:03:45
  of newcomers that have that are maybe transitioning from one
• 1:03:48
  religion to the other. But the point being was that,
• 1:03:51
  you know, I always encourage people is, is start with that,
• 1:03:54
  you know, or, or discover that aspect of things because they're
• 1:03:59
  going to be the ones to help guide you on this path.
• 1:04:01
  They're they'll be the ones that they are part of you.
• 1:04:03
  They are always there and they have an, a, a vested interest in
• 1:04:08
  you. You know, the gods are kind of
• 1:04:10
  they behave on their own agency and and have their own things to
• 1:04:13
  go on and your ancestors, that's that's directly tied to you.
• 1:04:19
  And don't neglect that and, and, and feed that fire, you know, is
• 1:04:22
  what I try to encourage people to do.
• 1:04:26
  Yeah, yeah, I agree 100%. You know, and I know, I know a
• 1:04:34
  lot of the Asian religions certainly put a lot into
• 1:04:38
  ancestor worship, but I saw a quote from somebody the other
• 1:04:43
  day they said, you know, no matter where you go walk like,
• 1:04:47
  you know, 1000 years of 1000 generations of your ancestors
• 1:04:51
  are walking behind you. And it's very true.
• 1:04:55
  And I, I think it's a very good quote and something to remember
• 1:04:58
  that, you know, you're not walking alone.
• 1:05:01
  You, you have thousands of generations behind you.
• 1:05:04
  And maybe that's why the whole, I always get a little irritated
• 1:05:10
  when I hear people speak about Heathenry as the Viking
• 1:05:15
  religion. That used to drive me nuts.
• 1:05:17
  And there's a guy, another guy that has a YouTube channel and I
• 1:05:22
  remember when he was first starting out and he's come a
• 1:05:25
  long way. I mean, and just four or five
• 1:05:27
  years, he has come a long way. But he would say, and you know,
• 1:05:31
  you put the Viking religion, the Viking, really, he kept saying
• 1:05:34
  the Viking religion, Keith and Rhee is many thousands of years
• 1:05:39
  old. Yeah.
• 1:05:43
  The Viking era lasted about 300 years, and I've even argued with
• 1:05:48
  people that the Viking religion was actually Christianity
• 1:05:51
  because those Vikings were instrumental and converting a
• 1:05:54
  large portion of Europe's Christianity.
• 1:05:57
  So don't focus so much on that Viking era.
• 1:06:01
  Remember, you know, your roots go back so far beyond that, so
• 1:06:09
  many generations beyond that. And you know, don't focus on
• 1:06:12
  that. Focus on everything that came
• 1:06:17
  before you because you're a part of everything that came before
• 1:06:19
  you. And you know, all that energy,
• 1:06:23
  all those people that came before you are part of you now,
• 1:06:27
  and you are cosmically connected to that.
• 1:06:31
  Yeah, yeah, it's a mixed bag. I mean, you know, have, you
• 1:06:36
  know, I, my immediate ancestors were not heathen.
• 1:06:39
  I, I, you know, again, when I, when I left my, the, the, you
• 1:06:45
  know, Christianity, it was, I was not the family favorite at
• 1:06:50
  all, you know, because that was, it was, it was antithetical,
• 1:06:53
  antithetical of everything that I was raised in, you know, you
• 1:06:58
  know, the, the, what the Bible says about pagans and heathens
• 1:07:00
  and this and that. And I'm like, well, sorry, I
• 1:07:05
  guess I mean like, if you don't, you know, I, I, I found out
• 1:07:10
  later on, you know, that it wasn't it.
• 1:07:15
  If you do good, if you're doing good work, if you're doing good
• 1:07:18
  things, things that are just beneficial for others and, and,
• 1:07:22
  and inherently good to some people, that's not what matters.
• 1:07:28
  What matters to them is, you know, what God do you worship?
• 1:07:33
  What book do you read out of what is your, you know, doesn't
• 1:07:36
  matter. Your deeds are good or not.
• 1:07:38
  It's and and I thought that was such a backwards way of thinking
• 1:07:43
  that you know, you can be a good person, you can do good things
• 1:07:46
  and then still be damned. Like what does that?
• 1:07:51
  How is that even? How does that work, you know?
• 1:07:54
  Yeah, I don't. I've never understood that
• 1:07:56
  either. So more or less, you know, you
• 1:08:00
  know, I've heard that argument. There was a minister where we
• 1:08:03
  used to live in West Virginia that used to come around the
• 1:08:05
  neighborhood and knock on doors and try to get people to come to
• 1:08:07
  the church. And, and, you know, me being,
• 1:08:11
  you know, the decent person I am, I would always invite him
• 1:08:15
  into the house, you know, offer him something, drink.
• 1:08:17
  And he would sit there and talk. And we would have these talks
• 1:08:20
  and these debates. And he would show me, you know,
• 1:08:23
  he would tell his point of view to me and I would tell my point
• 1:08:25
  of view to him. And he would constantly try to
• 1:08:27
  convert me. And I'd constantly like, yeah,
• 1:08:31
  I'm not budging, right. And this, this went on for quite
• 1:08:35
  a while. And his argument was that, well,
• 1:08:37
  you know, Jesus has died for your sins.
• 1:08:39
  And, and from that point forward, you know, if, if you
• 1:08:43
  don't, you know, ask God forgiveness and accept Jesus,
• 1:08:47
  and then you're damned. I'm like, really?
• 1:08:49
  So some tribe in South America that's never heard of Jesus is
• 1:08:54
  damned eternally because they haven't accepted Jesus?
• 1:08:59
  That. That's the most ridiculous thing
• 1:09:01
  I've ever heard. Yeah, I really do.
• 1:09:04
  I. Think if you have a strong moral
• 1:09:05
  compass, if you have a strong moral compass and you're a good
• 1:09:08
  person. And I think that's the
• 1:09:12
  difference. Our gods don't condemn us for
• 1:09:15
  being human. They don't tell us what to do or
• 1:09:18
  condemn us or reward us. They more or less said, you
• 1:09:24
  know, here's the example we're setting for you.
• 1:09:26
  Be, you know, the best that you can be.
• 1:09:29
  You know, that's its own reward. I've always felt that, you know,
• 1:09:31
  be the best you can be. And that's its own reward.
• 1:09:35
  You know, you're not going to be rewarded one way or the other or
• 1:09:39
  condemned one way or the other. And I think that's about as
• 1:09:44
  honest as it can be. I don't understand why there are
• 1:09:49
  still logical people, people that I know that a lot of the
• 1:09:53
  people that will swear that you're going to be damned the
• 1:09:56
  fires of damnation because you didn't accept their God.
• 1:10:01
  It. It's the most bizarre thing I've
• 1:10:02
  ever heard. It should be good enough that
• 1:10:04
  you're a decent person and and then you're putting out, you
• 1:10:09
  know, good things in the universe.
• 1:10:11
  But. Yeah.
• 1:10:13
  I think we're a long way from getting there.
• 1:10:17
  Man, it's it, you know, and look how look how far away we've been
• 1:10:21
  from that for how long, you know, I mean, just historically
• 1:10:26
  speaking, you know, humanity at large has, has really kind of
• 1:10:32
  gone off the rails for the most part with organized religion
• 1:10:39
  and, and, and all of that. And, you know, Heathenry
• 1:10:42
  paganism, you know, a lot of folks, and even I did, you know,
• 1:10:45
  when I came into this was, you know, like, you know, I could
• 1:10:47
  just do whatever I want. You're like no rules, no
• 1:10:51
  consequence. And I learned very early on that
• 1:10:55
  that's not the case. There is consequence to our
• 1:10:58
  actions. You know, you make the wrong
• 1:10:59
  decision. You pull out in front of moving
• 1:11:01
  traffic, you're going to get T boned like that's a bad
• 1:11:05
  decision. There's consequences to those
• 1:11:06
  actions. Same with anything, you know, So
• 1:11:10
  the, the reward or the punishment idea, you know,
• 1:11:15
  again, it, it comes in the moment, maybe not immediately,
• 1:11:18
  but there, there are, you know, every action, there's a reaction
• 1:11:22
  and there's consequence and there's reward to everything
• 1:11:25
  that's done. So I had to, you know, trying to
• 1:11:32
  explain that to my family. That was like, yeah, Nope.
• 1:11:36
  That, you know, you, you've already, you know, strayed from
• 1:11:39
  the path and, and until you come back and, you know, get right
• 1:11:45
  with God or whatever, you know, we don't want nothing to do with
• 1:11:48
  you and, and all of that. And that's like, but I do I, you
• 1:11:52
  know, that that kind of thing bothered me for a long time.
• 1:11:55
  And, you know, makes me think too about people that find this
• 1:11:58
  path and then maybe it gets out to their families that they've
• 1:12:03
  left Christianity. And then what that feeling of
• 1:12:06
  guilt can do to somebody to want to be like, all right, let me go
• 1:12:09
  back to this thing that keeps my family happy, right.
• 1:12:12
  Not wanting to be a disappointment or any such thing
• 1:12:14
  like that. I think that that's definitely a
• 1:12:16
  factor too to to some people's situations.
• 1:12:20
  Oh. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:12:21
  I guarantee you I was brought up in a household.
• 1:12:26
  You know, my grandmother was the accountant for the convent and
• 1:12:32
  Catholic school. Oh, wow.
• 1:12:37
  And you know, a lot of us went to that Catholic school.
• 1:12:40
  My uncle, who lived next door to my grandparents was a devout,
• 1:12:44
  devout Baptist, very strict Baptist.
• 1:12:49
  My cousin I remember being beat the women within an inch of his
• 1:12:52
  life because he found an ACDC record in his bedroom and his
• 1:12:57
  forty was worshipped the. Devil.
• 1:13:00
  Wow. Yeah, but luckily my
• 1:13:05
  grandparents weren't as bad as quite as bad as my uncle.
• 1:13:08
  But you still didn't, you know, claimed to be anything in that
• 1:13:17
  family. Yeah.
• 1:13:20
  I never rebelled against that. I just more or less did my my
• 1:13:23
  own thing and strength. You just never cared what
• 1:13:26
  anybody else thought. I guess part of that was, you
• 1:13:30
  know, my father was a black seep of the family and he didn't care
• 1:13:33
  what anybody else thought. You know, he had his own beliefs
• 1:13:35
  and I just sort of followed his lead.
• 1:13:39
  And, you know, he was another one that was all for finding
• 1:13:44
  your own way. You know, whatever truths you
• 1:13:49
  find in life, follow those truths.
• 1:13:51
  Don't worry about what anybody else, you know, tells you.
• 1:13:56
  Wasn't perfect by a long shot, but I did get a big part of my
• 1:14:02
  beliefs from him, I think. Not my core beliefs, but just
• 1:14:06
  that sense of don't suppress what you feel to satisfy other
• 1:14:14
  people. So I was lucky to have that sort
• 1:14:17
  of role model that didn't succumb to those rules and and
• 1:14:24
  regulations and. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:14:28
  You know, a lot of people don't, a lot of people are still
• 1:14:30
  brought up in very strict households that, you know, I'm
• 1:14:32
  sure there's a lot of fear for a lot of people of condemnation
• 1:14:36
  of, you know. Oh yeah, man, at least here in
• 1:14:41
  my part of the country, the OR, you know, just in this part of
• 1:14:44
  the state, even this is the South, you know, so there's
• 1:14:48
  there's, you know, churches on every corner.
• 1:14:51
  Christianity is the ruling class, you know, religious
• 1:14:54
  class. And so there's there's even
• 1:14:56
  folks. But Despite that, right, there's
• 1:14:58
  there's a very rich and vibrant Pagan community, not just
• 1:15:02
  heathens. I mean, there's all types of non
• 1:15:04
  traditional religious beliefs that are, you know, are around
• 1:15:08
  here. And, but there's, there's still
• 1:15:13
  people that, you know, I've, I've, I've met at different
• 1:15:18
  public events, you know, whether it's like a, at a coffee shop or
• 1:15:22
  in a park or, you know, whatever.
• 1:15:25
  And it's like, you know, they, they don't announce to, to, to
• 1:15:30
  on social media where they're going to, to things like that.
• 1:15:33
  Their immediate families still don't know they, they have to
• 1:15:36
  kind of stay hidden, you know, with their beliefs.
• 1:15:40
  They they can't, they can't be public about it.
• 1:15:43
  And it's sad, you know, like man, you know it, but it's also
• 1:15:46
  commendable, I think. And it's, and it's really, you
• 1:15:50
  know, something to be said for somebody who lives that
• 1:15:53
  lifestyle but does so with discretion.
• 1:15:57
  You know, there, there's some cunning there, there's some wit
• 1:16:00
  that I think, you know, is, is appreciated by the gods.
• 1:16:04
  You know, like having that ability to kind of go a fly
• 1:16:09
  under the radar, you know, be a little kind of tricky in a way,
• 1:16:14
  not to be devious, but to be smart and tactical, you know,
• 1:16:19
  cunning. Cunning, exactly, you know, But
• 1:16:24
  yeah. Yeah, you know, so high though
• 1:16:26
  we still have my beliefs to my in laws.
• 1:16:29
  You know, my wife just you know, she's advanced.
• 1:16:32
  You like, take that off. Yeah.
• 1:16:37
  To this say, and, and I don't hide things, but I, you know, I
• 1:16:42
  don't talk about it certainly in front of them.
• 1:16:44
  And they're good people. They're really good people.
• 1:16:46
  But yeah, yeah, no reason to mine, no reason to stir the pot,
• 1:16:51
  you know, No, I had that, you know, that happened to me one,
• 1:16:57
  one time. I was, I had already moved
• 1:17:00
  because I'm originally from New York and I moved, I moved away
• 1:17:04
  from New York back in almost 20 years ago.
• 1:17:08
  And there was a time when I was visiting my family and back in
• 1:17:13
  New York just about, I guess it was like 2018-2019 somewhere
• 1:17:20
  around there. And, you know, my, my family
• 1:17:23
  already knew that I was, you know, heathen that they still at
• 1:17:29
  that time where we're like, yeah, you know, if you come up
• 1:17:31
  and visit, we'll, we'll be nice. And I remember like, I didn't
• 1:17:36
  think anything of it at the time, but after the fact I was
• 1:17:41
  like, yeah, I kind of that was that was really not cool to me.
• 1:17:44
  That was, that was a bad move on my part.
• 1:17:46
  I I went over to my parents house and I had a shirt that
• 1:17:50
  said heathen on it. And I wore my hammer out of my
• 1:17:54
  shirt, you know, and I was unapologetic.
• 1:17:56
  You know, I'm like, I don't have anything to hide anymore.
• 1:17:58
  So why not just not flaunt it? But like, why, why hide it?
• 1:18:02
  Like, why pretend I'm something different?
• 1:18:07
  But I also like again, after the fact that it came to my
• 1:18:11
  attention, it was like, how rude, right?
• 1:18:14
  How disrespectful to go into your family's house who know who
• 1:18:19
  you know, oppose what you believe and that don't agree
• 1:18:22
  with you. How disrespectful of you to go
• 1:18:24
  in there and have it on open display that I'm a heathen and
• 1:18:27
  here's my hammer and all this. Like, you could have worn a
• 1:18:29
  plain shirt. You could have kept your hammer
• 1:18:31
  on, but under your shirt. Like, be respectful about it.
• 1:18:35
  And I'm like, yeah, that's I should have done that.
• 1:18:38
  That was a, you know, again, kind of a bad, bad form on my
• 1:18:43
  part, you know? Yeah, yeah, I see.
• 1:18:47
  It's like that. You know, I didn't mean to like
• 1:18:50
  go off into like the whole Christian versus heathen thing,
• 1:18:52
  knowing, you know, like the family situation that you just
• 1:18:55
  described and your wife being not a hero.
• 1:18:59
  I don't, I don't bash Christians.
• 1:19:00
  This is not a Christian bashing podcast.
• 1:19:02
  I never again, I have family that are Christian, that I know
• 1:19:05
  plenty of good people who are Christian.
• 1:19:07
  This is not, this is not an attempt to be like, you know,
• 1:19:10
  demonize some sort of, you know, class of people just because of
• 1:19:14
  what they believe in. They're just casual observations
• 1:19:16
  And you know, the, the, the, the some of everybody doesn't speak
• 1:19:19
  for, you know, or the, the actions of some don't speak for
• 1:19:23
  the, the, the greater majority by any means.
• 1:19:26
  Yeah, well, I, you know, I certainly don't fault anybody
• 1:19:29
  for the religious beliefs. The way I see it, if your faith
• 1:19:33
  makes you stronger and makes you a good person and enriches your
• 1:19:37
  life, hey, more power to you. This is mine.
• 1:19:42
  Whatever yours is, it's fine with me.
• 1:19:44
  I would never condemn anybody for their spiritual beliefs.
• 1:19:48
  And I believe it makes you a better person than you know.
• 1:19:52
  You go with it. Right, yeah.
• 1:19:55
  And I've told that, you know, but when my parents were still
• 1:19:57
  alive, I told them both, you know, that they're the, you
• 1:20:02
  know, I, I applauded them for their devout beliefs and, and
• 1:20:06
  being so resolute, you know, not budging.
• 1:20:11
  You know, you talked earlier about having visits from, from
• 1:20:15
  different religious folks in the area and then trying to, to
• 1:20:17
  convince you to, to think a certain way or believe a certain
• 1:20:20
  way. And you're like, yeah, no, not
• 1:20:21
  moving on. This one they had the same.
• 1:20:25
  Level of devotion in their faith.
• 1:20:27
  And I think that that's great. I mean, like you say, you know,
• 1:20:29
  if you can be, if you can find strength in your faith and and
• 1:20:33
  that's what you believe in, then then rock on.
• 1:20:37
  Yeah, and I was so upset when he stopped coming around because I
• 1:20:40
  loved our conversations. But eventually I guess he just
• 1:20:43
  gave up and stopped coming around.
• 1:20:45
  I was like, oh, and I don't remember his name now, but I'm
• 1:20:47
  like, no, he hasn't been around in a couple weeks.
• 1:20:49
  And my wife's like, you ran him, You ran him off.
• 1:20:52
  I'm like, no, I did. I enjoyed our and I really did
• 1:20:56
  enjoy our conversation. You know, you know, I've read
• 1:21:02
  the Bible, biblical history. I'm I'm a big Buffalo.
• 1:21:06
  Biblical history and history in general.
• 1:21:13
  Yeah, I'll have a conversation with anything, with anybody,
• 1:21:15
  about almost anything. And especially when it gets to
• 1:21:19
  like, you know, I have AI have a good friend who is Muslim.
• 1:21:25
  You know, he's one of the few people who I'm like, you know,
• 1:21:28
  if he's sick or something and he's in the, you know, he has a
• 1:21:30
  lot of medical ailments and things that that frequent him.
• 1:21:34
  And so sometimes he'll end up in the hospital.
• 1:21:37
  And I visited him in the hospital and, you know, we have
• 1:21:40
  conversations about, you know, what I believe in and what he
• 1:21:44
  believes in. And it's amicable.
• 1:21:46
  Like neither one of us are trying to convince the other
• 1:21:49
  that what they believe is the wrong thing.
• 1:21:50
  And then come over to my side. But we have really, you know,
• 1:21:54
  just inspirational and, and educational and enjoyable
• 1:22:01
  conversations about all kinds of stuff, not just our faiths.
• 1:22:04
  But when that comes up, it's like we learn from each other.
• 1:22:09
  You know, I got another friend who is into like Enochian
• 1:22:14
  beliefs, you know, So that's a whole fascinating topic if
• 1:22:19
  you've never explored it. But but it's, it's, it's like
• 1:22:24
  all types of, you know, you know, the book of Enoch and, and
• 1:22:29
  the, the unpublished books of the Bible and all kinds of wild
• 1:22:32
  stuff, you know, fascinating things.
• 1:22:34
  I've, I've sat for hours over drinks with this guy and, and
• 1:22:38
  had really good and fun conversations.
• 1:22:40
  So, you know, you can find good stuff and, and wisdom is wisdom,
• 1:22:45
  wherever it comes from. Is is like a famous Bandamanga
• 1:22:51
  saga. Is, is where you hear about and
• 1:22:52
  the wisdom is wisdom from wherever it comes.
• 1:22:54
  And you know, don't limit yourself from learning anything
• 1:22:58
  from anybody, regardless of their, you know, religious views
• 1:23:03
  or faith or whatever. You can get all kinds of stuff
• 1:23:06
  from everywhere. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:23:13
  But this has been a lot of fun, Chris.
• 1:23:16
  It seems like, you know, you've got a, A really stable place in
• 1:23:20
  your life where, you know, I have been doing this for 50
• 1:23:22
  years, my whole life for as long as I can remember.
• 1:23:26
  Appreciate you coming on here and kind of opening our eyes to
• 1:23:29
  a little bit behind the scenes and, and where it all came from.
• 1:23:32
  And you know, where you're at now.
• 1:23:33
  And you're, you're, you're pretty solitary, I guess you're
• 1:23:36
  or a solo practitioner, not affiliated to any sort of
• 1:23:40
  kindreds or tribes or anything. Get that right?
• 1:23:43
  Yeah, yeah, pretty solitary. I'm, I'm loosely connected to a
• 1:23:45
  few people in the general area. There's not a whole lot going on
• 1:23:49
  and, and you know, the Rehoboth Beach, DE area.
• 1:23:54
  But in the future, I'd like to change that.
• 1:23:56
  I'd like to hold what I call firesides because for me there's
• 1:24:02
  nothing more honest than, you know, Heathens gathered around a
• 1:24:06
  fire, you know, sharing drinks and conversation, you know?
• 1:24:12
  I love it. Just a fire people gather around
• 1:24:15
  a fire. People talking and in the future
• 1:24:17
  I'd like to do that here somewhere.
• 1:24:20
  We've actually looked into it and we're looking for land right
• 1:24:24
  now where we can host these kind of things.
• 1:24:26
  Hopefully in the future we can do that and get more people
• 1:24:29
  together in this area, but we're going to, we'll see how that
• 1:24:32
  goes. Oh, nice.
• 1:24:35
  Well, I mean, if you ever, if you ever get to a point where
• 1:24:37
  you want to kind of help get, you know, the word spread for
• 1:24:42
  the area and you want to come back on the show here and talk
• 1:24:44
  about that, if it happens, you're definitely more than
• 1:24:47
  welcome to do so. Just hit me up, let me know.
• 1:24:53
  People do crave that camaraderie that, that, that fellowship,
• 1:24:57
  like you say, being around the fire and just telling stories or
• 1:25:01
  just, you know, sharing a drink and, and laughs and sorrows
• 1:25:05
  even, I mean, just offloading, kind of unloading with people of
• 1:25:08
  like minds. People definitely look for that.
• 1:25:11
  And I know in some areas of the country, it's, it's, there's
• 1:25:14
  more going on than in others. So yeah, if you're ever inclined
• 1:25:20
  and, and have anything that you set up that you want to, to kind
• 1:25:24
  of get help spreading the word on, then happy to happy to have
• 1:25:28
  you back on here. I appreciate it, definitely.
• 1:25:33
  Cool. And thank you very much for
• 1:25:35
  having me on. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 1:25:38
  I'm I'm glad you wanted to come on here and thanks for giving us
• 1:25:41
  some insight into, you know, the life of a the lifetime of a
• 1:25:44
  heathen in Delaware, 50 some odd years gives encouragement to
• 1:25:49
  people. You know, you can this is a you
• 1:25:51
  know, in it, in it to win it in it for the long haul.
• 1:25:54
  So I hope everybody that's listened to this and watched
• 1:25:57
  this today and when it when it's out, you know, enjoys it.
• 1:26:01
  And if you did leave a comment on whatever platform, I know
• 1:26:05
  folks that listen to this on the on the audio platforms there,
• 1:26:08
  there might be some limited engagement available, but I
• 1:26:10
  think Spotify has comment options now and maybe other
• 1:26:14
  options too and other platforms. But definitely if you're
• 1:26:17
  listening and you want to watch this show, then you can do so by
• 1:26:20
  coming by becoming a patron on Patreon.
• 1:26:22
  And you can leave your comments down there in the comments
• 1:26:26
  section. All the details for that are
• 1:26:28
  annotated in the show notes, patreon.com/midgard Musings.
• 1:26:32
  Check it all out, Chris. Anything else that you wanted to
• 1:26:36
  add before we wrap it up? No, I'm good.
• 1:26:40
  Nothing I can think of. All right, don't drop off real
• 1:26:45
  quick. I'm going to sign everybody off
• 1:26:46
  here and touch base with you for just a couple of minutes after
• 1:26:50
  we get done recording it. But thank you again for being my
• 1:26:53
  guest this week. It's been great chatting with
• 1:26:55
  you and learning a little bit of your.
• 1:26:57
  Life. Yeah, enjoyed it.
• 1:27:01
  So everybody else, thank you so much for your constant and
• 1:27:03
  ongoing support. Hope you enjoyed this show.
• 1:27:05
  And if you did engage with the the platform that you're on,
• 1:27:08
  catching this in any way that you can to show your support.
• 1:27:11
  And until we talk to each other again, may the gods continue to
• 1:27:15
  notice you and may your ancestors smile upon you.
• 1:27:18
  We'll see you in the next one.