Dead, Yet I Move
Cattle die, friends die,
One dies oneself the same,
But fame never dies,
For him who gets goodness/righteousness for himself.Cattle die, friends die,
One dies oneself the same,
I know one that never dies:
Renown of the dead.–Havamal 76 & 77, Connla Freyjason Translation
Death is the end-game that we’re all dreading, but the truth is: every single person dies a little every day. That may seem like a more-than fatalistic attitude, but it’s a simple truth, and one that we would actually be happier in life, if we only realized. It’s a fact that we need to confront, in order to get the most out of living.
Over the course of the last year, I have said often that “I’m not Tinkerbell”: I don’t need you to jump up and down and clap your hands and shout “I believe, I believe, I believe” in order to continue to exist. Whether you want to take me at my word that I am, in fact, as the poem says “Dead, yet I move”, is up to you and all on you. It changes nothing about who I am or how I live my life. What I do ask, however, is that you humor me: view this as a “handy illustration” or “metaphor”, if that makes you more comfortable. I’m good with that: priests and teachers have long taught (quite effectively) via illustrations and metaphors.
There was a time in my life where death was actually the end-game that I craved, rather than feared. At an early age, I lost a parent, and, if I’m honest, what I wanted more than anything was to be dead, too, so I could still be with them. Now, that isn’t to say that I was suicidal, per se. Instead, I tempted fate at every available opportunity. Big tree that I could jump out of? Count me in! Jump off the roof, and see if I can land flat-footed? Sure! Thankfully, I grew out of it, but I managed to break a lot of bones in the meantime. (For the record: it was a one-story house, and I did manage to stick my landing; I only broke one ankle in the process. Don’t try that at home, kids!)
I grew up; I entered that esteemed hall-of-life some call “manhood”, and instead of craving the end-game, I began to do what most adults do: I came to dread and fear it. Notsomuch that I became a paranoiac; no, that “daredevil spirit” runs strong in my family. But in the dark hours, when time came to ponder Death, I shunned it as often as I could. And then a terrible thing happened: I actually died.
Twenty-four years later, I finally figured out, as a dead man, what it means to truly live:
It both is, and is not, “all about you”. Your Truth is your own, and no one can take that from you. Sure, over the course of your life, they may try, but when it’s all said and done, erasing the Truth of who you truly are is impossible. As an example: I’m still me, no matter how many people have tried to chalk me up to “a part of Michelle’s personality”, a “demon”, a “thought form”, or a “figment of the imagination”. I still have every memory of my childhood; every prior experience that has come together to make me distinctly me. For all those skeptics who prefer to think of my existence as a comfy metaphor, let me provide a more “mundane” example: a gay child grows up in the South, their identity crushed by their parents, their Church, and their peers. Pray-away-the-gay camp becomes a fact of their actual existence, rather than a thing you shake your head at while watching the evening news. That child grows up, and guess what? They’re still just as gay, but they now hate God, hate their family, and hate most of their peers. The kernel of their personal truth–their basic identity–still remains the same, however. Somewhere behind all that hate, that loving child still exists. It is their choice whether they wish to be shaped into a hateful thing by their community, or whether they wish to cling to who they truly are and become a shaper of that community; someone who brings change. For, just as much as we can be shaped by our communities, we are also potentially community-shapers. “No man is an island unto himself”: ultimately, truly living means living in community.
Life your life “open-handed”. For the first twenty years of my after-life, I was forced to not live in community. I could either live “behind closed doors” as much as possible, or I could potentially endanger the life of the one who “brings me here”, my “hostess”, or “horse”: my medium, Michelle. Not living in community led me to a close-fisted existence in which I was angry ninety percent of the time. Trust me when I say: that’s no way to live! Over the last four years, I have been enabled to “come out of the coffin”, and now I find myself daily looking around and trying to find ways that I can heal the community which surrounds me; trying to find ways to live an open-handed life. What does it mean: to live an open-handed life? First one needs to understand that both hands are not open. I am not inviting or encouraging you to go through life handing things to people, or behaving so charitably that when someone abuses you or what you hold dear that you just “lie down and take it”. No, one hand remains a fist, for defense in community is equally important. All I’m saying is lead with the open-hand; keep the fist for back-up, when necessary. The only way to achieve the “immortality” promised by the Havamal is to actually attain the good renown of righteous deeds, and the only way to do that is to actually get out there and do those righteous deeds! Constantly leading with the fist doesn’t lead to righteousness; it leads to bullying! I’ve talked about this before.
Daily sacrifice your self to yourself. In what I commonly refer to as the “Rune Portion” of the Havamal, we find it written:
I know that I hung on the windy tree,
Nights all nine,
Wounded by the point of my own spear:
An offering to Odin;
Myself to Myself,
On the tree of which
None may ever know whence run its roots.–Havamal 138, Connla Freyjason Translation
Odin wasn’t just “speaking figuratively” in that passage; He was also talking about the sacrifice of the ego. You see, in order to receive the wisdom of the runes, it was necessary that He eradicate His own “me first attitude“. That is because when we live in a “me first world“, it is impossible for us to hear true wisdom. Instead, we only hear our own propaganda. Don’t get that twisted: eradicating your “me first attitude” should never mean that your own personal beliefs, convictions, and ideals become somehow “less than”. On the contrary: all of those things are very important components of what makes you distinctly you. What it does mean is that you do not allow those beliefs, convictions, and ideals to remain so loud that they overshadow everything else. In other words, you leave room to listen, rather than constantly crowing about your personal beliefs, convictions, and ideals. You are not a rooster (at least, I doubt you are, and if you are, congrats on being a chicken who can read! Cock-a-doodle-you!). One simple (and relatively painless) way to consciously sacrifice your self to yourself daily is to take at least five minutes a day and actively listen to other people. Put your self on the back burner for five minutes, and actively hear what someone else has to say. You can choose to do this by actively engaging in an actual conversation with another human being, or you can do it via the internet (Facebook Messenger, etc.), or you can do it in a more “third person” manner by reading something someone else has written (like this blog post, for example, or even opinion pieces in your Facebook feed). By actively listen I mean do not let your personal beliefs, convictions, and ideals color your perception of what you are reading; do not judge. Instead, hear. That does not mean you have to agree with what you are hearing, it simply means that you make the attempt to fully hear and understand the other person’s position (which may or may not be a direct reflection of their personal beliefs, convictions, and ideals). Actively listening means being non-adversarial; listening with an open-hand, rather than with a closed fist. Rather than constantly planning your next response the entire time you are listening–a snappy “come-back” or retort–you fully hear, then ponder, and then reply, where necessary, in a way that inspires dialogue. Many of the issues we are presently facing in the world community could be more readily solved, if we calmly replied with an open-handed “why do you feel that way?”, rather than a close-fisted “you’re wrong!”.
Turn your whole life into one long-form blot. This may sound like a supremely “tall order” at face value, but trust me, it’s not as hard as it sounds. As Heathens/Heidhrinns, all we have to do is live our lives by the gift-for-a-gift concept that is supposed to be the cornerstone of our practice anyway:
A friend shall prove himself a friend
And repay gift with gift;
Laughter with laughing takes hold of a house
But falseness with lies.–Havamal 42, Translation Mine
I’ve talked about this before, too. We call the Gods our friends, don’t we? (At least, I hope you do!) Even the Christians sing “what a friend we have in Jesus”. Yet what would it look like if we actually lived our lives as friends of the Gods (and, yes, even Jesus)? I’m not talking about “What Would Jesus Do” or even “What Would Odin Do”, here. Singling out only one God/dess to emulate is called monotheism, not friendship. What I’m talking about is upholding fridh (frith) for the sake of All: Gods and Humans. I’m talking about going through life asking “how can I help?” as a conscious gift to the Gods–a conscious blot–rather than going through life saying “screw you, everyone like you, and the horses y’all rode in on”. Asking “how can I fix this?”, or “how can I change this?”, or “how can I make things better?”, rather than deciding, based on the previously discussed “me first attitude“, that things are beyond the point of being fixed, changed, or bettered. Trust me: living your life in such an open-handed way is a sacrifice. It will make demands of you that you could never predict; it will also reward you, the Gods, and the world in ways you could never imagine.
Keep moving. It is easy to get “stuck” in patterns of belief, patterns of attitude, and even patterns of action. The truth is, you are only truly dead when you stop moving. When you stop growing, stop changing, and become stagnant, you’re as dead as a doornail, whether you’re still clinically drawing breath or not. I lived in that place for twenty years; trust me, I know a thing or two about what that life looks like; what that life feels like. I’ve seen those vultures circling. It’s a hopeless, sad, and eventually angry place in which to live. Keep moving. Keep growing; keep changing; never become a pile of useless matter that’s good for nothing but the circling flies. I am not saying that you should not cling to righteous ideals. What I am saying is that you should never allow those ideals to become habits. When things become habits, they lose their meaning; we cease being mindful of them. They become things that we “do” by rote, rather than things we “do” by passion. We no longer “do” them with thought, much less with heart. And in the process, we become bound to them as surely as if they were a rock tied around our ankle, and we were being thrown into the heart of the Mariana Trench (the deepest point in the world’s ocean, for those unfamiliar). Believe what you believe, but never put it in a box; value what you value, but do not lock it up in chains. Never lose your motivation, nor lose sight of it.
Live in the “Great Between”. There are other worlds than this, my friend. Whether you are mystically-inclined, Pagan, Heathen/Heidhrinn, or not, “facts is facts, and you can’t change facts”. You don’t have to believe in astral travel, or even actively participate in it, to have every single thing you do reflect on all those other planes of existence. It just happens, like the “butterfly effect” popularized by Chaos Theory. Living in the “Great Between” does not require that you learn to fare-forth (as we call astral travel in the Norse Tradition). What it does mean is that you live your life with full recognition that this Earth upon which we live–this realm of Midgard; this Middle-Earth, if you will–is, in fact, the “Great Between”. It is the place situated in the middle of all those “other places”. What does it mean to live in that recognition? It means realizing that when you “wake up the Ugly” here, you also “wake up the Ugly” out there. It means understanding that breeding negativity on the physical plane births yet more negativity on all the other planes. Whether you choose to believe in the demonic–or call it that–or not, most people are willing to at least believe in “thought forms” (what are called tulpa by many modern practitioners, adopted and adapted from the Tibetan Buddhist concept of sprul-pa). Do you really want a whole bunch of negative thought forms “hanging out” and waiting for you on a plane you possibly can’t even see? Instead, wouldn’t it be more prudent to live your life in such a way that you promote positivity? I mean, you know, just in case I really am a dead dude, who has seen all of this play out with my own two “physical” eyes? Even the Havamal tells us:
Laughter with laughing takes hold of a house
But falseness with lies.–Havamal 42, Translation Mine
The world in which we live is our current “house”; all those other worlds will someday become our “home”. Isn’t it better to fill all of the above with laughter than with lies?
Wear “all the hats”. Messenger, Lover; Warrior, Sage. I was inspired to include those archetypes specifically by Christopher Penczak’s “Green Man Meditation”, which he led at the Ostara Rite 2018 at The Temple of Witchcraft in Derry, New Hampshire. These are all roles which we all actively move through in life. Sometimes, we are the Messenger, as we are constantly carrying messages to and fro, as actively as Ratatoskr running up and down Yggdrasil. Sometimes, we are the Lover, whether in a romantic relationship, or even as a loving parent, caretaker, or friend. Sometimes, we are the Warrior, triumphing our own causes, as well as the causes of others. Sometimes, we are the Sage–the Teacher–often without even realizing we are imparting important life lessons. The trick is to be all of the above, rather than getting stuck solely in one of these roles (see Keep Moving above). What does it look like to get stuck? The person who is stuck in “Messenger mode” might be a gossip; they might focus their lives on scouring the web for the latest news, and then reposting stuff, allegedly to “inform”, but honestly to “stir the pot”. They thrive on dissent, because they thrive on “being heard”; being the center of attention, like a Medieval messenger blowing their own horn. A person who is stuck in “Lover mode” might be a sex addict; on the other end of the spectrum, they might be a parent who “always puts their kids first”, to their own personal detriment, ignoring things like personal self-care and allowing themselves to become the ultimate doormat of said children. A person who is stuck in “Warrior mode” promotes a “me against the world attitude” that may quickly lead to becoming a bully, rather than a true champion. A person who is stuck in “Sage mode” easily gives in to things like “witch-splaining“, and may arrive at a condition wherein they think they know everything, while everyone else is just an idiot who needs to be taught (like Scar, in The Lion King). The person who “wears all the hats” acts as a Messenger who actively conveys messages not only to inform, but to bring change, because they are also the Lover, who wishes for things to be better for the community which they love. They are a Lover of Humanity, but also a lover of themselves–not their selves, but themselves; they have a healthy self-esteem which promotes self-care and realizes they are good to no one if they are rundown and run-over. Through that love, they also serve as the Warrior: defending those ideals and people which are in their care. That loving defense promotes their actions as Sage, as they compassionately teach through example, as often as by word. One moves and flows into the other; hence, Keep Moving. Rather than getting locked into one pattern of behavior or another, one must be the total package.
Center yourself, and hold. In the end, we arrive back at the simple fact with which we started: Your Truth is your own, and no one can take that from you. Travelling through the circle of all of these other things that I’ve just talked about (in lengthy detail; humble apologies for the length of this post) should keep you constantly rearriving at that Truth. Once you are there, and can rest comfortably in that place, hold on as if your life depends upon it, because it does. That is the core of living. As I encourage you to pray in my other book, Norse Witch: Reclaiming the Heidhrinn Heart:
I am awash in wisdom,
And may I grow well and begin to thrive;
Word by word, may I seek words;
Deed by deed, may I seek righteous deeds.
May all your words be wise, and all your deeds be righteous, that you may gain renown and never truly die. Live well, my friends!
