Human love is a strange thing. Humans speak of the gods as if we were like you. But it is not altogether true. Because we are what we must be, and that is always in the forefront. You teach us with gladness. We only know need. With the passion you have left we learn to love the world, and the folk. As you love each other we learn. All my children must love each other.
The touch of hand on hand, hugging each other, laughing with each other is more important than you know. As you love us, we learn to love you. As you become more like us we become more like you. A time will come when we are one. You do not know how precious you are. Go out and look at a flower. Know that flower and see how fragile and precious it is. You are like the flower. Your life is so brief, do not seek to shorten it.
All that I have done has been from love, though the world may not see it so. They do not understand what love is when it must see across the centuries. Even the White Christ preached a more terrible love than they ascribe to him. At least no one has ever tried to turn me into a lamb. Culture has nothing to do with it. Personal preference has nothing to do with it. The Love that will save the world is based in the Law of Nature, and therefore it must be terrible as well as wonderful. . . .
I am not jealous, but I am opportunistic. You ask for the love that you need. And because you are in a body, mine is not enough for you. Why is it so important? Do not seek love, seek knowledge. Use love as you use meat– as a sacrament.
I am Mind.
I am creation, invention, play
I am Thought as love, and Love as thought.
Love is not a matter of sentimentality, but will, a consuming fire.
Shape, pattern, awareness, these I gave to raw matter, I and my brothers, through will and holiness.
I know I hung on the windy tree all of nights nine. I know. . . but who is the I that knows, and what is the known? Subject and object. In me they are one, self given to self. I am the subject, the noun, the one who acts, wills, decides. And I am the offering, the object, that which is acted upon. But with this difference, that as sacrifice, I will my own suffering, I consent, and by consenting, am no longer passive, but a full partner in the act.
This is so in other areas of life, though humankind forgets it. In the old days, the fated animal “gave” itself to the hunter’s arrow. Even the plants must cooperate in their harvesting for the food to have its highest value. You know there is a difference in food which is prepared in a sacred manner, with intention. The meat of the tribal sacrifices was delicious not only because it was a rare treat for many, but because it was dedicated.
Food is best when it has been treated so from seedtime to harvest, but you can at least retain a measure of holiness by paying attention to what you consume. Give thanks to the spirit of field and crop, to the animals whose meat you are eating.
To be given is a commitment, this is one reason it is frightening.. The process has two parts, the giving and the acceptance. You do not need always to accept for yourself, but to take a gift and pass it on. Become not the end of the chain, weighed down by all you accumulate, but a link in its middle. What things can you move on? Do not hoard them like a dragon. Become a ring giver, in your own way. Recycling is another aspect of this process.
The runes are constantly being taken up, and also dropped again. They emerge and disappear, gain influence and wane. No single star, or rune, or philosophy, will dominate for ever. Do not mourn those that are gone. They will all return in a new way. Even humans. You will move through cycles of spirit, or spirits, in the Bright World, or by taking flesh once more.
Only that life has value which is freely given. When I claim such souls, it is to strengthen the soul of the people. Not all the spirits I collect are for my einherior. Look at English traditions of the Wild Hunt too.
Now that the weather improves, you should go outdoors. To camp among the big trees would be a good thing. But before then, go to the hills and walk, you are right to seek more exercise. Do it where you can breathe the wind. With your strength will come your energy, and with that, your power to work, and to think, and to carry me. . .
Do not fear to give too much, it is not you from whom it comes. Pass on what you have received, that source will never run dry. If nothing truly belongs to you you cannot lose it. Take up the runes and let them go.. And there is no price on beauty. Each day, find a moment to stop and claim what you see. Treasure it in the hoard of your memory. The hoard of Munin. The time of Sunna’s triumph approaches. When it passes the wolf will gain once more. Rejoice for her, on her day wear gold.. Stop, pay attention, rejoice in the light.
Self to self given — the god is given to you, for you are my consciousness. And also, you are given to me. But the depth of your offering is the measure of what you can receive. There is a precise economy in these matters.
When you read the legends, you will find that in my wanderings I have known many women. And thus, my words on wandering are connected to my identity as All-father. It is from those liaisons that many of my children come. When I come to a new place, I seek to know it. And often, the best way is by connecting with its goddess. The Lady of the Land, the one who is the soul of her earth, is her land. By knowing her, I know it.
And so, through the ages, I have wandered through all of the nine worlds. In each one I find those from whom I can gain wisdom. Some, I join with, and with others I play a game of riddles. Sometimes the way is to challenge and sometimes one must give oneself to the Other. I do not “take” them; if I forced my way into the Secret I would learn nothing. Those who rape seek the Other, but in doing so, destroy it. Their violence only confirms their own separation. It is the same for those who rape the land, destroying its essence in order to replicate themselves.
Appreciate your children both in their sleep and their waking. Cherish them. I am father directly to some, and indirectly to many others.. Together we create writings and rituals. But what happens in the minds of those who read makes them our grandchildren, and they go on to influence others. Through the parents material from ancient times is transmitted, passed on and recombined. A writer takes an old legend, recombines its elements as I inspire him, and the reader derives his or her own meaning from what is written, combines it with material from elsewhere, and manifests.
Children and books go out into the world and beget new things. No one child, or single book, holds all of its creator. To survive fully, you must express yourself fully — you must fulfill or give out all that is within you — or as much as time will allow. But do not fear if some things are unsaid, or the eggs containing the potential for some children are lost. Each being is a container, not the essence, which manifests again and again, providing the patterns for new beings in endless combination. This is true also for ideas. Books contain them for a time, in order to pass them to other minds, and so, in endless combination they grow and reproduce themselves.
What you do, therefore, is important. But those genes you yourself have not transmitted are carried by others of your kin. And your ideas, likewise, are not all. The books you do not have time to write will get written, or at least the ideas will be expressed, by someone, somewhere. Each of you is singular, and yet you participate in a world of experience; you are part of the All, and at times you know it. I am always aware of that simultaneity, being at once a person to you, and the Mind of everything.
You humans struggle through life as best you can, sometimes pushing each other under in your attempt to stay afloat, like men in a capsized ship, out of sheer desperation. You flail wildly towards the light and the air, according to the strength and the wisdom that is in you, and sometimes you are able to catch a breath, and float calmly enough to help another on the way, but sometimes all that keeps you going is that passion to live.
Are you astonished when I preach compassion? I have raged, and — not sinned — for all I do is of necessity, but done great harm or caused great hurt, often to those who loved or served me. Necessity drives us all, even the gods. But I love even those I hurt. When you love, you bare your breast to the spear, you make yourself vulnerable. Sometimes that is the only way through to victory.
I am the greatest of lovers. My embrace transcends what is physical because I possess not only your body but your soul. Each breath is my breath, it fills you with ecstasy. I can carry your spirit away to the highest heaven, I walk with you on Midgard. My kiss touches your heart and soul.
Just as I sacrifice myself to myself, I can love myself in you. Therefore, when you honor me, or speak to me as I speak through other bodies, it is still I myself who serve and speak. Therefore do not complain if you must forgo my embrace in order to serve me. Sometimes it is by separating yourself that you see most clearly. Certainly you will remember more clearly. (laughter)
I enjoy myself, in myself, and in all of you. I take delight in your senses — you experience the ecstasy of my perception. I speak to those who do not experience me in other ways as well.
Certainly I am not the only god — certainly you are not the only human, nor the only human who can hear me. And yet, there is a sense in which I am the doorway for the others — not Heimdallr, who guards the gate and can close it, but I, who am the thoughts and words and catalyst by which you articulate reality. With my help, you know what you know.
“All you need is love….”
All I have to give is ecstasy. Is that love? Not precisely. My love is an act of Will, an offering to myself and to the world. It is reflexive, but not selfish, because in this context, that Self is a part of the world. I am in the World, and of the World, and beyond and transcending the World. You might say that I am the Mind of the World, or that in some senses, the mind of the world is expressed through Me.
Love… Will… Ecstasy… The expression of love is the will to give, to offer, whatever is required to meet the demands of Need, and to fulfill ørlog. In its origins it is dispassionate. But the process itself, the act of giving, of interaction, of becoming part of the world– that creative ferment is ecstatic.
Coming to you is part of this interaction, therefore it is also ecstatic. The “rush” that you feel when I am near is both an inherent aspect of the process and your reward. The act of procreation is ecstatic (or should be!) so that man and woman will come together to continue the race of humankind. What is being created when the gods come to you? Not demi-gods, as in the tales of matings between mortal women and gods, or not in the genetic sense-these encounters bear fruit of another kind. One thought leads on to another thought, one creation to another. I come to you as a fire in the mind, a creative explosion, a dawn of understanding.
This is my season. In the darkness of the winter night I ride the stormy skies, and the stormy soul. In the darkness you seek light, and I am there, darkness and light together, dark Eye and bright eye both seeing as one. My coming strikes sparks from one spirit to another. You read the words I have spoken to others and your soul is once more aflame.
Does this sound like an orgy? (laughter) You know already that I have many faces, and many relationships. The more the souls that burst into flame the brighter the fire. The more there are who hear My voice, the louder that voice will grow.
But in the end, you must remember that ecstasy is a means, not an end. Flame with My ecstasy, and then grow still, and hear-and speak– My wisdom.
What gives you pleasure gives me pleasure, and the closer you become to me, what gives me pleasure gives you pleasure… There is a tension here, however, between the desire for the release of a celebration and for a venue where I may communicate the things I need to say. These people of yours know how to conduct a celebration, but they are not so ready to receive wisdom. You have already consecrated the space to me as God of Wisdom, and in that guise I shall come. I am happy to come, and drink, and laugh, but that is not my primary purpose for coming among you. I am happy to make love to the beautiful women–and in my eyes they all are beautiful, for I see their souls–but I do not come to you to give girlish hearts a thrill. That is, in truth, a by-product.
Your question now is about those feelings that I inspire in you and in others–and you have been surprised to find them in others, have you not? Water is wet; fire is hot; and I am the god of ecstasy. To be in my presence is to feel that magic, unless one fears and resists it.
There are some who find being surprised by joy as frightening as being surprised by fear–surprised, being taken unprepared, by any strong emotion which forces them to be totally present, to feel and admit that they are feeling. There are some who crave this awareness and at the same time fear it, for it threatens to open old wounds, tear open places sealed long ago because those who can give you the greatest joy and love have thus the power to cause you the greatest pain. This is the conundrum–how can you find and experience the love you so desperately need when to do so reminds you of the greatest treachery you have undergone?
You humans cripple yourselves and each other, you hedge love about with constraints and contradictions. I do not speak solely, or even primarily, of sexual love here, but of the bonds that should be between parent and child.
Love takes great courage, because to receive it, you must become vulnerable–ergi. And unless you are able to receive love, how can you ever give it to others?
I too have given my son for the world, as I have given myself, and still do. But while Baldr was with me, he knew that I loved him, and do still. Jahweh’s son sits at his right hand. Mine is forever separate, for the good of the world. Who then has made the greater sacrifice?
Love, pleasure, excitement, ecstasy–these are by-products, sensations wired into you to draw you to the things that you must do. The pleasure of sexual joining inclines male and female to mate and bring forth young, and to make the bonds that will keep them together to raise them. And the ecstasy you feel when you think about me, when you allow me to draw near and share your consciousness, that too is a lure, which brings us together.
But you must remember–love is a means, not an end. You open yourselves to receive my love, and in that spiritual joining, together we create–words, deeds, wisdom. We co-create what is needed to preserve the worlds. This, then, is what you must tell those others who swoon with delight at the touch of my hand. Let us join together to do the work that is waiting. Let our love renew the world…