G&R's 2023 Retrospective: Animism
G&R’s community of readers and writers is diverse – we are all over the world and hold a wide range of spiritual practices. But if there is one belief that may unite us all, it’s Animism.
Not all people who believe in the principles of animism utilize the term, in fact, it’s still quite obscure in the face of mainstream religions and cultures of the West. Those of us who do identify with it, and use the term, often need to follow up with a definition. We even define animism to other animists, because it’s a bonding experience to explain what it means to us, in our own words.
Animism is not to simply talk about animals with respect, or to perceive every single thing as having spirit. On the other hand, someone may very well join us in the comment section to say that’s exactly what animism is. To me, animism is the antithesis of the cult of self – it’s boundless connection. A connection with a spiritual essence is one of those things you only know when you feel it, but you still have to seek it. And nowadays, it’s so easy to get too lost in the grind to do that. A Beautiful Resistance exists, perhaps, to remind us to continue to look for this connection, whenever we can.
I could argue that every single article G&R published in 2023 addresses or endorses some facet of the animist ideology. This retrospective, however, is compressed into the pieces that cite the term somewhat directly. Beyond the articles, we have also hosted a course and published two books that fit this theme – one which forms the unbreakable bond of a shared vision for a healthier, holier world.
–Mirna Wabi-Sabi (Site-editor of G&R)
Below you will find a retrospective of the animist content we published this year. Enjoy.
FIVE PRINCIPLES OF GREEN WITCHCRAFT
with Asa West
“Using ritual, trance, spellwork, and lots of time in nature, this 5-week course will explore what it means to practice authentic green witchcraft. We'll use the lenses of unity, liminality, embodiment, reciprocity, and silence to explore animism, folk deities, wortcunning, and other aspects of this deep and joyful path.”
The course is divided into five parts, each focusing on one of the core principles of Green Witchcraft. The first one being:
The forest speaks with one voice (Animism, the egregore, spirits of place, and attention as magical practice).
(find out more about this course here, and its book here)
An anthology of lullabies
by Rune Kjær Rasmussen
One day, when I went for a walk on a path I often wander on, which leads the way
out of town and to the countryside, I saw a large ox lying in a huge pile of mud at
the outskirts of the field. It was so powerful to look at and at the same time full of
calm. I felt an urge to, in some way, get the same connection to the soil as this ox
so obviously had. The muddy soil was his home. To use a very human term it
looked incredibly meditative. The calmness of the ox radiated at the same time an
immense presence; his body was right there, but also a huge absence, perhaps
you could say introvert, about the way the ox was there. A breath that seemed
timeless.
(continue reading here.)
Who Are the Watchers?: Sightseers, Snails, and Spirits of Guam
by John Halstead
“The animism of the indigenous Balinese is now overlaid with centuries of Hindu influence, in much the same way that the underlying animism of the Chamorro is overlaid by centuries of Catholicism. Abram’s interpretation of the Balinese ritual, although it might differ from the interpretations of the local practitioners, is worthwhile in so far as it neither disregards the ritual as superstition, nor resorts to a supernatural, and hence dualistic, framework for understanding what was going on. This is, I think, the essence of animism.”
(continue reading here.)
“A fascinating example of environmentalism and animism intersecting can be seen in villages in the North and Northeast of Thailand. In essence, villagers would select a forest and build a small shrine within the forest for their ancestor ghosts to live in. It is believed that the ancestor ghosts, in return for the conservation of the forest, will in turn protect their villages and cast blessings to improve their lives. The forest is called Don Phu Ta— a source of food and income, as well as a holy place. It is believed that the ancestor ghosts will be angered should trees from the forest be cut down. Most villages have a dedicated Don Phu Ta Forest along with a representative called the Tao Jum who is believed to be able to commune with the ancestor ghosts. This system of folk belief is one that thereby promotes environmental conservation.”
(continue reading here.)
Encounter With a Fox
by Philip Kane
“Scientific studies have shown that forests, the trees and plants, have their own forms of consciousness. That the woodland is bound together by a web of communication and mutual support, threads of mycorrhizal fungi beneath the surface helping to make the woodland a kind of collective consciousness that has been described as “the woodwide web”. In that space, for those few moments with the fox, it felt as if both she and I were also an integral part of that web, not separate but drawn together. My physical senses seemed sharper, somehow expanded.”
(continue reading here.)
I Was a Fox
by Philip Kane
“I lived a lot like a wild animal, at that time, and carefree except for the one thing. I was nearly always hungry. My parents were poor, and naturally my father spent most of the wages he earned on his drinking. My clothes were usually ragged, handed down from other children who had already torn them here and there. Food was often scarce, and when we had food then my father had to keep up his strength for work and my mother ate to stave off misery.
That is why I learned to steal.”
(continue reading here.)
Folklore of the Elder: The Macrocosm Through the Microcosm
by Emma Kathryn
“Folklore is a passion of mine, as is almost anything relating to folk magic, folk stories, folk songs, you get the idea. They are fascinating, the stories, myths and legends that are passed down through a culture, but what exactly does that have to do with animism, witchcraft and the wheel of the year?
Folklore and stories are passed down through the generations of a culture.
Do not make the mistake of thinking of them as silly old stories mothers told their babes to frighten them into compliance or old wives tales, consigned to the past and viewed with nostalgia of a simpler time.”
(continue reading here.)
Swan cubs and Trampoline
by Rune Kjær Rasmussen
“When she woke up again
all the bats around her
hanging from the ceiling
opened their eyes too.
- It’s time to fly, the night said quietly
and it was as if there was a star
in each of her cells
when the fluttering started up.”
(continue reading here.)
Witchcraft: A home of questioning
by Rune Kjær Rasmussen
“What does tenderness mean to an owl?
What does courage mean to a dying cat?
Do not tell me there is an iron curtain
between instinct and intellect.”
(continue reading here.)
A Stranger in Paradise: On Our Relationship to Nature
by John Halstead
“In the day, the forest and I were one. I was an animal in an animal’s habitat. In the night, I was an unwelcome human being in a bustling community of other-than-human beings.
Somehow, both of these realities felt true.
This experience relates to a discussion which often arises in animist circles about our use of the word “nature”, a concept for which many indigenous cultures do not have a word, as the existence of the word itself implies that there is something that is not nature. Are human beings and our creations part of nature? On one level, yes, absolutely. And yet, there is a sense in which our creations, our artifices (read, artificial), are separate from nature—at least from wild nature. And this is true of us as well, because our artifices can make us feel like we ourselves are separate from nature.”
(continue reading here.)
Winter Musings: Of Land & Of Lore
by Emma Kathryn
“As we continue our morning walk, woman and dog, I marvel at the transformation of the dark, empty streets. The world feels like a different place. Or perhaps that isn’t quite right. It isn’t the world that has changed but my perception of it, my experience of it. The world and rituals of the everyday are for later on and won’t stir until the world begins to wake, and this moment is nothing more than a secret memory. Now though, moving through these unpeopled streets, the spirit of place, while not loud and abrasive, is felt more deeply, its song a soothing melody that can be felt rather than heard. No longer are these just the streets of a council estate, but are instead a living place, one no less worthy of wonder than anywhere else, no less alive than anywhere else.
This is the essence of animism. This is the stuff that fleshes out dry and dusty dictionary definitions. This is the real. It encompasses the well lit street lined with gardens where cats slip in and out of the darkness, and the lonelier places, where the darkness seems to gather and pool, a solidity that seems to swirl and sway the more you look at it. It stretches out beyond the street, over field and river and woods. It is the trees, the plants, the creatures, both waking and sleeping. It is the land and everything that shapes it. It is within us too, and the stories we carry, our own and those we collect and inherit from our interactions with the world and our own history.
Animism brings us back to ourselves. It reminds us we are connected to the land and to one another. It can give strength to people who might feel they have no power in this world. Animism brings us back to our humanity. How can it not? We cannot be connected to the land and everything within it without being connected to one another and ourselves. When we see the land as alive with spirit, how can we fail to see the same within ourselves, within our fellow humans?”
(continue reading here.)
“Organic pluralism, an embrace of multiple, conflicting truths, and a deep understanding of the interconnection between humans and the natural world: all were core values of oral and animist cultures. As global climate change and the collapse of Empire throw the earth and our modern societies into crisis, these core values are what humanity and the nature it destroys desperately need again.”
(find out more about this book here)
KALEIDOSCOPIC FORESTS
by Rune Kjær Rasmussen
“RITONA is pleased to announce the publication of Kaleidoscopic Forests, a collection of 56 poems from Danish animist and poet, Rune Kjær Rasmussen.
Startling, playful, and profound insights drip from every leaf of Rasmussen’s work, refracting the everyday into an explosion of dazzling meaning.”