element invocation guardian choices

[spook]

I hope that title makes sense.

so in another thread that got off topic I mentioned that my worship was kind of Ecclectic and pulled from things I researched when something seemed to speak to me or seemed to be appropriate or a good idea to me.
I had begun in the last few months to tailor my element invocations to be more suiting to my worship and thought I had found a good fit in using four different "wolf/canine" representations/energies from the Norse mythologies and pantheon.
seems I might need to rethink that.

[Lost_Demise]

Wolfs are not meant to serve you, the more you try to chain it the more it will not like you. I think the last thing one should use in their corners is an animal that loves to break rules and follows only whom they please. A wolf is not a dog, they are not obedient nor docile.

[JuniperBerry]

I see what your saying.
is their energies not even worth pulling from?

Norse myth doesn't really deal with pulling energies from something. The gods aren't tools, with a neutral power supply that goes to anyone that taps into it, they're...gods. One honors them and the gods decide whether to accept your gifts or not. Trying to work with Fenrir isn't going to get you far. If they accept your gifts, then they might add to your luck, they grant your protection, you can feel them being a part of your life...but heathenry really isn't about magic, either. And any magic that is done is more about the practitioner and her own strengths and not the strength she gets from deity. The term volva does have etymological connections to vulva, and women have a latent ability to prophecize, weave the ways of Wyrd, etc. If you're interested in heathenism then you connect with your ancestors, the Dsir, the land wights and gods. It's uh...pretty complicated. Fenrir isn't going to be any help to you.

garm is still hel's guardian demon doggy though yes?
I was using garm for north.

Garm is Hel's wolf, and he's also a destructive force. He kills Tyr, the god of justice and light (among other things) in Ragnarok.

Bloody he was | on his breast before,
At the father of magic | he howled from afar;
Forward rode Óðinn, | the earth resounded
Till the house so high | of Hel he reached

He eats death. He eats blood, destruction. It's what he feeds on. But he's chained in Hel. He can't help much here in Midgard.

.

but it actual seems to be a still okay fit. a lot of my work has to do with utilizing misunderstood aspects.

Well, they aren't really misunderstood. They're the fact that our galaxy will fall apart. Everything has a cycle of life and death. Skoll devouring Sol is like the energy that the sun exerts finally eating itself up until the star collapses. There's no misunderstanding there. You can't call on those "energies" to stop or change their ways, or think if you get in good then you have them on your side. You'll be sucked into the blackhole just like the rest of us.

The germanic gods are extremely complex beings. Look at the mythology, where wolf didn't necessarily mean wolf but had a completely different meaning when seen within the proper context. To say that Thor is thunder, or Freyja is sex, and turn them into black and white attributes and symbols is really...not calling on the Norse deities or beings at all. It's easy to misunderstand or think they're being misunderstood if you don't understand the full view of them.

I am in no way trying to trample anyones ways or beliefs by my way of collecting the bits and peices of them that speak to me.

I didn't think you were. But I am heathen, and so I have to answer these things. Either you'll say nevermind it's not for you, or the depths of it will inspire you further. But I think first and foremost, with whatever a person is working with, they need to know how it fits into it's mythology and it's deeper meanings.

[spook]

I was doing nothing of the sort,I was asking them to come and protect me while I worked.
asking not telling.
your reply got my hackles up immediately.
if you knew me better you would really know why.
I'm very canine minded or I guess my spirit is very canine.
I would never try to hold or chain an energy in that way.
I usually only ask it to help me or let mecmake use of it.
that might be why some of my spells never come to fruition,they decided not to lend me their energies or to help.
I worship the moon because it calls to me.
I worship hel because her situation speaks to me and I had an experience with her.
I do my best to do what feels right to honour them and make them want to keep helping me or being there for me.
besides I've been informed that wolf....in a lot of the Norse tales is a word used to denote outlaw type things.
replying to lost....

[spook]

I think this is what i liked about hel.
she's a giant grey area.
she's not exactly evil or particularly golden good.
she's kind of mundane that way.
I've never delt well with absolutes in that sense.
she was wiling to accept things as they were,take the hand she was delt.
I'm not saying she doesntvget mad about things.
I'm just finding it hard to call upon the elements without hanging like an element ring leader to call up.
also I am never going to disagree with you regarding heathen Norse things,your like an expert compared to what I've researched,but I've never gotten a truly evil vibe from what i read of garm.
garm is stuck down there in nifliem but I would think garm might have developed a bit of a relation ship with hel being down therectogether. read itcsymbolicaly or literally if you like,but garm helps hel if you ask me.
garm being chained to the Icy earth down there works for me as a guardian of sorts that symbolises earth and north.
is there not in Norse pantheon a greater lesser element for the differentvgods?
I didn't really think hati and skoll were considered gods,which is why I was considering them as ok to envision as entities symbolic of things that could work as guardians.

[Ravencry]

Why not just call upon your spirit guardian to watch over your circle, since that is a spirit guardians area of expertise, so to speak.

[spook]

spirit guardian?
howxdoes one know if they have a spirit guardian and if so what or whom would it be?

[JuniperBerry]

I think this is what i liked about hel.
she's a giant grey area.
she's not exactly evil or particularly golden good.

Funny, I was just having a conversation about this the other day. None of the gods or beings in Heathenry are all bad or all good. For sure the jutons don't think they're bad even though they're the enemies of the Aesir, and the Aesir aren't evil even if the Juton's see them as enemies. Many juton women have married Aesir gods. What's happened is that the Aesir have set up a reality for us that is compatible to our survival, happiness, and existence. The jutons threaten that. It's like living in your home and locking the door against burglars. The burglars aren't inherently evil, but they threaten your home and so you keep them outside.

One theory I've read on Hel is that her light and dark halves represent the different faces of death. Blaoting, pale color on one hand, and then shrinkage, blackening skin. She isn't necessarily half-beautiful and half-dead. And she IS death. Visualize a beautiful flower, alive and vibrant. Now vizualize it wilting and dying. That loss of essence, that death is Hel. She didn't accept a fate to rule the dead...she is death. Odin only put her ..talent...into order. We can't have everything dead as Hel runs unchecked, can we? But Hel isn't bad, just as death isn't bad.

I'm just finding it hard to call upon the elements without hanging like an element ring leader to call up.

The elements aren't really something I can help you with, since I'm not a practitioner of that. Ravencry has a good idea about guardian spirits. Here's a post I made on the heathen ones.

also I am never going to disagree with you regarding heathen Norse things,your like an expert compared to what I've researched

Heh. I only know a drop in a bucket compared to the recons I know.

,but I've never gotten a truly evil vibe from what i read of garm. garm is stuck down there in nifliem but I would think garm might have developed a bit of a relation ship with hel being down therectogether. read itcsymbolicaly or literally if you like,but garm helps hel if you ask me.

Yes, I agree with you. Except I don't think they're stuck. They're in their element. She has mansions and halls. She's surrounded by people. Hel isn't a bad place.

is there not in Norse pantheon a greater lesser element for the differentvgods?

I'm not sure I understand what you're asking.

I didn't really think hati and skoll were considered gods,which is why I was considering them as ok to envision as entities symbolic of things that could work as guardians.

No, they aren't gods. But in heathenry, all spiritual beings are wights. Land wights, sea wights, Skoll, Garm, Odin, Freyja. Just like I'm human and Obama is human, but he's the President with power over a country and I'm powerful over my household.

[spook]

I'm going to look into the spirit guardian thing,but I have never been able to make the calling the elements up to guard a space Thingy jive with my working even though the idea seemed like a good one.
I can still use the elements for my workings during ritual without needing to have them guard my space every time right?

the experience i had with hel was short but very vivid.
I was meditating on some incense smoke and I don't recall falling asleep but I must have because I remembercwaking up.
lol
but I had a "dream" that hel came to my bedroom and hung out with me,she was peaking around at all my things while we conversed,I never remember what we talked about,but she picked up a comb from my dresser and next thing I know I was combing her hair and I helped her braid it into two braids,her hair was very course and wiry and sandy beige grey.
and when I woke up there was a very long like two feet at least long scraggly grey hair on my bedroom floor.
I've got short blond hair dyed black and my dog has short black and White hair so I know it wasn't ours.
LOL
I felt very rested and happy,like pleasant and light,but also a bit out of breath.
she was taller than me and very thin she looked a bit like a dehydrated person but her face wasn't ugly argali nor was she all beautiful ,she was very plain looking with thin lips and large almond eyes,they were light coloured but looked dark in most lightings. her skin coulor was greyish white. she had a very serious facial expression. but kinda curious too.
lol
that was my experience.
it still feels very vivid even though it was ages ago.

as for the question you couldn't understand,it's ok,you answered it.

[Ravencry]

You can meditate, and ask your guardian to reveal themselves. That usually works well.

[spook]

thanks for all the info and conversation and suggestions.
I'm glad this didn't turn into a "your doing it wrong and ruining everything" finger wagging session.
I was at a message board yrs ago thatvwas like that.
rather elitist.
I have to go do my dishes now.
I will let you all know if I find myself with a spirit guardian anytime soon.
lol
it might be those pair of wolves I used to dream about in high school or the she wolf me and my dog ran into in the cemetery yrs ago. then again it could be the racoon I spent the night inside of one time when I was in elementary school.
that was a weird "dream".
me and my brother shared a bunk bed.
the window was open cuz it was warm out.
one night I heard a noise sat up in bed and saw a racoon on my window sill.
I stayed in bedvand it went away.
then I dreamed that I was running thru my back yard and thru the bushes to the neighbours yard and around a garbage can....but my point of view was really close to the ground,I remember the way the mud and dirt looked.
then I saw my face in a puddle...a racoon shaped image looked back at me!
lol.

I haven't had any amazing experiences lately but it's only been the last yr or so that i have been trying to make doing rituals a more regular event,because I felt like I wasn't keeping up my end of the bargain,if you know what I mean.

I do one every full moon and one every dark moon.
even if it's just little thank you rituals and nothing fancy.

[Ravencry]

You could have many spirit guardians, or one could be the guardian, one the guide and your totem (in Navajo belief, the totem is the one that represents your soul. Mine is the wolf, and he has been with me my whole life. Perhaps yours is, too)

[JuniperBerry]

It's not my place to say what your experience meant. Is it possible, though, that you were visited by an ancestor and she had the 'smell' of Hel about her? This would mean you experienced both Helheim/Hel concept and an ancestor. Not that Hel doesn't visit Midgard, but usually epidemics and deaths follow her.

thanks for all the info and conversation and suggestions.
I'm glad this didn't turn into a "your doing it wrong and ruining everything" finger wagging session.
I was at a message board yrs ago thatvwas like that.
rather elitist.

You caught me on a good day.

[spook]

I can't honestly disagree with you juniper except to say that there was absolutely no doubts or questions as to her identity at the time.

[Lost_Demise]

Why are you so convinced it was such a mighty figure, asking from curiosity not to seem rude.