This week’s prompt invites me to describe a man who has positively impacted my life.
Interestingly enough, I’m currently working on a Q&A video and some of the questions have, in some roundabout way, touched on the topic of male role models. On that note, and in light of today’s prompt, I’m going to share a personal story that recounts my experience with the first High Priest I ever saw leading a full ritual.
Several years ago, I was a first degree initiate in a Gardnerian coven. We had a High Priestess, but no dedicated High Priest. When it had come time for my initiation, someone traveled to help perform the ritual. He’s a great dude and I’ve been lucky to develop a closer relationship with him over the years, but he’s not the person I’m basing this answer on. Being that it was my initiation, I didn’t really see the full ritual. If you don’t understand that, sorry no spoilers, you’ll just have to take my word for it.
I can’t give you an exact timeline because I’m terrible with dates, but it was at least a year until I had another opportunity to see one of our rituals with a man, a High Priest, in a leadership role. That’s a long time. It was an especially odd situation for me because I was often the only dude present in our coven, so I was expected to perform the priest’s jobs. I had words to read, I had instruction given to me by my High Priestess, but I never had a real person to watch or emulate. Our tradition is oathbound, if you didn’t know, so it’s not like it was something I could just pull up on Google — the exact words and actions are secret (well, they’re supposed to be). There is a certain element of oral lore that you can only be exposed to by hanging around your elders. Honestly, after a full year’s worth of rituals, there were some blanks that I just had to fill in for myself.
One day, Selene and I were invited to a small “coven family” gathering a few hours away — these are people who might have hived off from the mother coven and started their own. It’s kind of like when you have cousins over to your house for the holidays. We knew that spontaneous rituals were likely to occur at these gatherings; moreover, we knew that there would be more than one seasoned High Priest and High Priestess present — some of them were even magickal partners. We could finally see a balanced ritual!
Our hopes were high. We made the trip. When we got there, we heard talk of a ritual being planned. In fact, by some accounts, a ritual was definitely going to happen. I was so friggin excited, sitting around a bonfire, eagerly awaiting the start of this magickal event that would finally answer so many of the questions I had in my head! I started mentally preparing a checklist of specific things I wanted to pay attention to and make note of.
What actually happened, however, was that it got late. Everybody got tired. Too tired, they said, for ritual. I was pretty bummed. Selene and I returned to our hotel room and got some rest.
The next morning, we returned to the gather. Most people had packed up and gone home, but I think my High Priestess had been talking to some of the others… a High Priest and High Priestess, who happened to be a magickal couple, agreed to lead an impromptu ritual for us to observe. Bless their hearts!
It was the first time I was able to fully see a man in this role during ritual. I watched the nuances of his performance, noted the subtle similarities and differences between what he did and what I did. On top of that, we witnessed the energy of a circle lead by a couple. It was truly an amazing experience and I’ll never forget it.
It’s funny how we build things up and how we judge ourselves. By that time, I had probably lead dozens of rituals, but found myself unable to feel completely validated until I was able to watch someone else do it — specifically, another man.
I suppose it’s one thing to say “this is what I do because it’s what I do,” but quite another to say “this is what I do and what others have done before me.” Today I’m happy to say my practice is a healthy mixture of both.
Good morning and happy Monday, friends!
I’m writing to you from the start of a very tired week. I couldn’t even finish this post last night. I feel a little behind on things.
Yule is coming up, which means I have a sabbat article to write. We’ll also be attending a Yule ritual later this week and I’m greatly looking forward to it.
But there’s also Christmas shopping to finish up, gifts to wrap, and some Christmas-related travel this weekend.
Over the past week, I finished my tips video for RAV. I wrote, recorded, and produced a song featuring the RAV Vast Drum, vocals, cello, piano, drums, and synth… and then I shot a full music video for it. I spent many, many hours editing, but I’m happy with the result. I’m not sure exactly what day they will post it to their social channels, but I’ll be sure to update when I see it.
I also finished my series on shielding, which was one of those “small” topics that I originally thought “how will I even write one full article on this?”
Music, Myth, & Magick now has a time slot of Mondays @ 10PM on Witchcraft TV.
Can you spot me in the programming lineup?
Of course, you can also always watch any of my content on YouTube whenever you choose.
In other news, I’m wrapping up my text answers on all of the Q&A stuff — this week I’ll be starting to film my answers for Episode 6. I’m not sure how long the video will be — by word count alone, it’s measuring at 30 minutes, which is a lot (by contrast, this entire post, including the writing prompt section, is clocking at about 5 minutes.) If it gets too long, I guess I could always split it into two videos. But my goal is to have this filmed and finished before the end of the month! Once again, I appreciate everyone who sent in a question because I couldn’t have done this without you!
I’m going to go write about more Yule stuff. Also, I preemptively wish you a happy Yule and a wonderful week.
Cheers!
Aerik Arkadian 
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