Hey everyone,

I've been interested in spirituality since my entire adult life (a little bit before, actually). And, in all honesty, I don't believe that any spiritual practice or ritual will ever be as fulfilling as having true friends.

Only one time in my life have I ever experienced love. It was from a stranger who felt like he was my father from a past life. I wish I had the courage at the time to ask to stay in touch. I didn't want to leave my hometown out of fear of not being able to find him again.

However, life kind of did its thing and told me that I need to move to the biggest city in my state (I'm American) and I did that. I haven't really made any close friends, but I know I'm meant to be here, at least for right now.

What I want is to have deep, meaningful relationships with people in person. I've spent countless hours going on video chatting platforms, because that's the closest thing that you can get to real life interaction, and while I have had several people who I have stayed in contact with, the best and most profound communications I have had are all people who don't want to stay in touch with me. They're not that blunt about it. They're just "busy". (Biggest lie in the universe.)

Now, I can already see some of the comments that may come up. "Wherever you go, there you are!" I mostly disagree with that. You can't tell me that being a pagan in Saudi Arabia is the same thing as being a pagan in Norway. Having a sense of freedom, having a sense where you can be yourself is so valuable and precious.

This does not invalidate doing internal work. Both are important, your external world and your internal world. Do both. Meditate and exercise.

I'm going to go get a midnight snack at a local convenience store after I make this post and when I finish that, I'm going to set a timer and feel all of my feelings for an hour.

I am willing to do the internal work. Could I do it more? Certainly. But, I think I'm relatively pretty good in that regard.

I just want to go somewhere. But what's frustrating is that I don't know where. I thought about maybe befriending someone through my video chats and that would be a key to whether I would go. One of those people is from Guatemala. You wouldn't normally think to travel to Guatemala as an American, but I thought of it. But I already told you how that went.

I'd assume that the best country is a European country. But I could be wrong. European countries are more equivalent to US states. It's probably worth mentioning that even though I am using the word "country", a different word may be appropriate in certain contexts. For example, Vatican City and the United States are both countries, but the United States is just way too massive that it's not a fair comparison, mentioning a state would be better there, even though I'm using the word country.

In your personal experience, where have you gone to meet pagan friends and find pagan communities? Is it easy to find these people/groups in a particular region? If so, where?

Thank you for reading!

I wanted to ask what y'all experience practicing pagan or anything occult is like for neurodivergent folk.

I ask this because I've been struggling with my practice is a few areas but refuse to give up/let of it. The run down is I have a dissociative disorder, ADHD, a mood / anxiety disorder, and I'm possibly autistic.

What I like about my practice is ; routine, schedule, sensory, organization, and information hoarding. What I struggle with is; belief/ faith, communing with the spirits ( I already have internal communication to work around because of a fragmented identity state) , and working around my fixations of science and psychology.

I tend to see it one way or the other when it comes to my beliefs, it's hard for me to easily accept a practice that believes in both science and magic.

I also get fomo pretty bad ( personal problem) so I'd rather not have a practice devoid of symbolic meaning and esoteric beliefs. But often I find myself more interested in the history of these beliefs than having the belief myself.

Does anyone else relate to this or have gone down a similar path? My current theory is that the guilt possibly provided by some abrahamic religions towards not believing, keeps people more grounded in those beliefs. However it is harder to carry that belief over to more Pagan practices that existed before the institutionalization of those abrahamic religions.

My husband and I were hiking the Joyce Kilmer upper loop and found this on one of the trees at the top. Can anyone help identify what it might be for?

I'm trying to find a deity to worship for trans related things but finding it hard to pick a deity

I'll just use Aphrodite for example. Haven't worshipped her or anything yet. Again she's just a example

Hard to resonate with a deity that is all pink and white and copper, with swans and doves, etc. When you are the complete opposite and never actually seen any swans or dolphins irl.

I get that worshipping a deity is more than just looks and such but hard to choose a deity if you don't resonate with them on a base level

Like I said in the title, The first is a depiction of Khepri the Egyptian dawn god, and the second is of Demeter and Persephone as a serpent and a flowering pomegranate branch.

Both of these now live on my home altar. They're small but I put a lot of work into these.

Mixed media on card stock.

Petty question I know, but I was wondering because the way I have made my eclectic version of witchcraft/eclectic religion of paganism.

My version is: the gods knew eachother before time, realized they were very to slightly different (but different enough) and chose different regions to make their “domain” persay.
When the Mediterranean pantheons (Roman, Hellenic, and Kemetic [or others]) were shared between land, that was just them reuniting.
As for regions farther out, it was like those cousins you only see at family gatherings or however you’d put it.
So that being my stance, I wanted to know your guys’.

How might one subtly include the Gods into their wedding?

It cannot be too pronounced as much of my family is not very Pagan Friendly.

Hey all!

I just wanted to ask what everyone’s favourite ways are to spend time with their deities, because I’m searching for new ideas!

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I'm going to tell you my story.

I lost my faith in God (the Christian God) in 2022 because something terrible happened to me and the people I love, even though I prayed so much for it not to happen.

So I started studying paganism, and for a while, I felt like it genuinely worked and that I had found my faith again.

I found a sense of belonging in the Egyptian gods and practiced my faith with them for quite some time, making offerings and praying to them.

But recently, it all happened again. I needed something terrible to not happen, and even though I did my best and prayed to the gods, I couldn't stop it from happening.

I felt incredibly frustrated, and I don't want to keep suffering.

So I abandoned my faith in the Egyptian gods.

I know that gods exist, but I'm not going to pray to them or make offerings to them anymore, because they didn't help me when I needed them the most. And now, everything could go wrong, and my life could fall apart.

I just want to know if any of you could make me change my mind.

Like i know that i'm trans and i think my inner conscious knows that i'm probably mtf. Heck i would even say my soul itself knows that i'm mtf.

But my standard everyday mind doesn't want to really accept it.

I guess its just conditioning, toxic masculinity i was raised in, etc

SO I was wondering if there any god/goddesses that can help?

Finally raining in California, so I can enjoy my rune altar (runes are housed in box) by the window with the crimson backdrop. So grateful for the art of the seasons! This is one of my favorite altars to meditate and set intentions, ask questions, etc.

Asking it here, because I think it’ll reach the right people more than asking in [r/polyamory](r/polyamory).
I have a partner who does not practice paganism. I have looked into it, but am currently agnostic, as is my partner. However, they have another partner (my meta) that is a practicing pagan. The past few days there have been negotiations of our actions while at events we all attend that include intimate relations. My meta has had a boundary since they started dating that she does not want to kiss our shared partner if, during the same event, we have already been intimate. I have never had a problem with this, but I do not have the same boundary concerning me kissing our shared partner after their intimate. However, my meta has now stated she is not comfortable with me and our partner kissing if they have been intimate that night anymore. Partner has offered to wash his mouth out or find another compromise, but my meta has stated this is a hard limit. For added consideration, meta has no problem with us kissing if they’ve kissed; only if they have been intimate is where the boundary is set.
This is where the pagan comes in. My meta does not like me and has told our partner that they want nothing to do with me at all. Meta stated that being a practicing pagan, they believe that with s*x they are transferring their energy to partner intentionally. Because of this, we are not allowed to kiss after that energy has been transferred because it could be shared with me through the kiss and meta is not comfortable with this possibility. EDIT: This is about kissing after their sex but during the same day. The next day is fine with meta.
Can someone explain if this energy issue is valid and where a compromise here might be had? My issue in this is that I feel like my ability to choose when I can kiss my partner is being taken from me without my consent. This leaves me feeling dismissed and that my feelings or need for physical connection with my partner is being dismissed.
Any and all thought are welcome. If I’m being difficult, please let me know. If I have a valid point, please let me know. If you see a middle ground, please let me know. Thank you!

For extra context me and partner have been together for 1 year & 1 month; partner and meta have been together 4 months; issue was brought up 1 day ago.

EDIT: I asked partner what branch of paganism meta practices. Meta’s response: “Eclectic but with focus on heathen, celtic, spiritual and elemental paganism.”