Limen: Thoughts from a threshold

My summer seems to have gotten away from me again: in a week, I’m back at work for the school year, with some new responsibilities, so I’m in “Argh, get life in order now!” mode.

I spent Friday at our local IKEA, picking up various items to help with that, which leads to my post today.

Background:

One of the things my covenmate asked me, back when I sent her the Role of the HPS post, what I thought the role was in regard to the covenstead: is it automatically the place where the HPS lives. I have some philosophical thoughts about that I’m still trying to sort out into words other people might understand, but I do know the practical thing it kicked off for me: a desire for my home to be a place where I can say “Sure, come right over, I’ll be here.” A place I can host (small) group ritual in. A place I can teach in. A place I can have friends - or group members - over and be hospitable.

There’s just one trick.

I live in a tiny little house - 400 square feet, the size of a studio apartment, though it’s divided a little differently. There are many things I like about it.

• It’s the amount of space I actually need for me and the cat.
• I can clean it thoroughly in about 2 hours, if I have to.
• It’s far more private than an apartment - there’s at least 15-20 feet between me and the next building.
• It requires me to think very carefully about how I live, and what I bring into my home.
• It fits my budget, and a larger space wouldn’t right now.

But there are also challenges. Now that I’ve lived here for a year, I have a much better sense of what they are, and which ones I really care about dealing with.

Some of them are just about the space: the tiny house dates from the mid-50s, and has at various times had tenants who did not take as good care of it as might be hoped. Plus, there’s an elderly gas stove and heater (they work fine, but they are not elegant or shiny or new.) There’s some cosmetic damage to the kitchen floor, a few places where the front room floor is splintering slightly (easy to throw a rug over), and so on. My landlady is aimable about fix-up work I want to do, like painting the bathroom, but money is a limit (on both sides!)

There’s also some limits for group work. My front room is about 8×11 feet, and has 3 bookshelves in it. It will fit 6-8 people, we think, if people are friendly about it (it requires a little moving around during circle casting, etc.) which is around the limit of what we want for the group anyway.

However, to do this, everything in there except the shelves have to be moveable. And yet, I need to make sure there’s enough seating that 6-8 people could potentially sit around and chat and eat after ritual. there’s still a question of seating.

(I should note here: L and I are rotating who hosts ritual: she has somewhat more space, and substantially more outside space. On the other hand, doing things at her place means affecting her partner’s schedule. He’s very amiable about it, but at the same time, we want to keep things balanced.)

Some solutions:

As of this weekend, I have two hard kitchen chairs, a computer chair, and a stepstool that people can sit on. The idea is that these would be easy to move around, but more comfortable seating for conversations and teaching. I also have plans for more floor pillows (something the cat approves of.)

The last thing I want is one or two ottoman footstools (padded, but square and portable) that can be used for seating, and otherwise live in the corner. I’m also considering 2-3 TV trays that can be used for portable tables (or quarter altar space) but I’m still considering where I’d store them.

So, what happens for ritual?

• The harp is moved into the bedroom alcove, along with any other furniture we’re not planning on using.
• The computer gets moved from the desk (in the front room) to my dresser (in the alcove). It’s an iMac, so this is fortunately pretty easy.
• The low bookshelf in the west (usually my personal altar space) is cleared, and used as the west quarter altar.
• I just got a set of narrow shelves that live by the computer desk (used for the east altar)
• A flat-bottomed chair and a stool get used for north and south altars, respectively.
• The desk can also be used to eat around after ritual, with a little planning.

The only part of this that is particularly tedious is moving the computer (and even that is only about a 5 minute process).

There is one other thing I’m considering, which is creating fabric drapes to go over the tall bookshelves, so that people do not need to look at my book selections during ritual. (I’m thinking that light but opaque fabric held on with strips of velcro would do nicely, and other people have suggested that this should work, but I have not yet gone fabric shopping or put them together.)

Inside my head:

But there’s also what it means for my own habits: it means training myself to put things back neatly on visible shelves. On keeping the books down to what *can* be shelved. On keeping on top of dishes and other such things (so that not only are they not distracting, but we have dishes to eat out of afterwards!) The rest of my week is getting devoted to doing a chunk of this and getting things lined up so that I can maintain them when I go back to work.

I grew up with a mother who was very particular about house-cleaning - and I was *not* naturally neat as a child. Naturally organised, yes: I knew where in a pile of stuff things were. But not tidy.

I’ve been learning tidy as an adult (and am currently in a weird place where I strongly prefer things to be tidy, but don’t quite have the habits ingrained to keep them that way even when I’m tired/out late/got lots of other demands. I’m working on it.) I intend to talk somewhat more about this at some point, but some of it is complicated by chronic medical foo (asthma can affect cleaning for me, and as of yesterday, we appear to be having late-summer pollen allergies kicking in: traditionally my worst season. This means I’ve got less energy to spare, and it takes me longer to get moving in the morning.)

This post goes with my previous post on financial costs of group work, as I think that being aware of the time we spend on something is also an important conversation to have.

Getting there:

Obviously, besides gas to get there, it’s going to take you time to get to where you’re meeting. My current driving time is 0 (for things I host) to about 30 minutes each way (heavy traffic, right after work) at my covenmate’s. More normally, it’s about 15-20 minutes. At 2-3 trips a month, that’s 40-90 minutes of driving time. Pretty reasonable.

In my former group, the drive was a bit longer - more like 35-40 minutes, and sometimes worse. When I was doing 8-10 trips out there a month, I was spending at least 4-6 hours in the car. This was slightly less fun, especially with later evening events and getting up early for work.

Preparation:

If I’m hosting, I need to spend about 2 hours preparing in advance. I live in a little tiny house (more on which in a future entry, because I want to talk about how I’m thinking about what a covenstead is), but 2 hours is plenty of time for me to do a thorough cleaning, sweep, do all my dishes, move the furniture that needs to be moved in advance of ritual, move the computer, and so on.

The good news is that much of this is work I should be doing anyway (general housekeeping) and I can keep on top of it fairly easily, or split it up over 3-4 days. The ‘day of ritual’ preparation (stuff that must be done that day) takes about 20-30 minutes, mostly moving furniture and computer and sweeping afterwards.

Ritual bread baking (for use in ritual) also takes time: the basic recipe I use means I need to be home for about 3 hours. However, most of that time is rising time: I can be doing things on the computer, cleaning, petting the cat, or working on a hobby for all but about 20 minutes.

Ritual:

Ritual takes as long as it takes, but generally, we plan on 2-3 hours (including setup and food after) for a moon, and generally longer (4 hours, sometimes more) for a Sabbat, because what we’re doing in ritual is often designed to take longer.

Discussion:

We schedule our discussion nights for a worknight, and I get up early (I start work at 7:30, so get up around 5:30.) So far, we’ve been finding that a 6-9 or 9:30 discussion works really well for us, and we’re trying to do 2 a month. 7 hours, give or take.

Classes:

In my former group, classes were twice a month, once for around 3 hours, and once for 4-6 hours. In the new group, I want to leave it somewhat more open ended, with the idea that student and teacher should be seeing each other twice a month (because this helps build connection, and keeps things on track) but that times can be variable.

Class preparation time, now, that’s a tricky one. With an existing curriculum, like the one my former group had (where teachers for a specific class had notes to work with), preparation is mostly reviewing the material, and teaching - pretty quick for most of us. For the new group, I’m redesigning from the ground up, so of course, it’s taking hours and hours and hours for each class, plus a bunch of time for the overall structure.

(This is what happens when I work in an excellent high school for years: there are all these educational theories I’ve seen in practice that I want to make some use of.)

Personal work:

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I believe that the foundation of good group work is personal work. Yes, this is hard. No, I don’t always manage to do it.

My personal goal, these days, is 5-10 minutes of moving meditation work in the morning, 5 minutes or so of devotional work as I begin my day, and ideally 10-15 minutes worth of meditative or astral work in the evening. I’m trying very hard to add 10-15 minutes of musical work each day, too.

It’s a goal - I usually manage two of the three on a good day.

I also spend a fair bit of time (probably an hour a day) reading material that directly impacts my religious life - online Pagan discussions, books, magazines, and so on. I also spend time on a regular basis writing material - posts in those discussion, entries on this blog, posts on LiveJournal, and so on. (This probably comes out to half an hour a day, but there are days I’m writing for 4 hours, and days I do none.)

One of the things that I’ve been thinking about are the actual costs of group work - in terms of both time and financial cost. I’m not talking about paying for training, mind you - just about the other things that go into it. With rising gas prices and other costs, I’ve seen more discussion of this in people looking for groups, but there are very few specifics out there.

Now, obviously, I have one set of experiences: the numbers below are not going to reflect everyone’s experience. But I do want to put some concrete numbers out there (along with where they come from) so that other people can get a general idea of some patterns.

(This gets very long, so you click on to read the details)

Read the rest of this entry »

Yet another post inspired by interesting search strings that show up in my stats. (Incidentally, I am greatly delighted by the interest in my recent book lists and HPS theory posts. Thank you, all, who’ve been reading and commenting and passing links on!)

The search string in question was “advantage of group rituals” It’s pretty obvious, if you read various other posts in this blog that I am a big fan of group rituals. But I have not yet talked about exactly why that is.

Scratching the itch:

First and foremost for me, group ritual scratches itches inside my head that personal ritual never does. It’s something about the interaction between me and other people in a sacred space. Don’t get me wrong: I value personal work as well, and I think it’s essential for a well-balanced religious life. But if I go more than about 6 weeks without group ritual, I notice myself getting more and more off-kilter.

One of my motivations, yes, for getting my 3rd degree, is that it means that no matter where I am, I can form a new group, should I have to. I very much hope doing that from scratch in a totally new place without any other groups around I can visit won’t ever be necessary - but I feel a lot better knowing that I have the tools and skills and abilities to do so.

But why does it matter to me? Good question, and there are some reasons I still haven’t puzzled out in the more than a decade since I noticed this. But there are some I’ve figured out…

Singing in harmony:

My standard comparison on this one is singing. You can sing many wonderful, amazing things by yourself. You can move minds, change the way people see the world, relax or annoy them. But what we can’t do with the human voice is sing interweaving harmony parts by ourselves. If we want to do that kind of music - which, again, has many wonderful options - we need more people. It’s not that one is better or worse than the other. But they are different, and they sometimes do quite different things.

The experience I get from singing to myself is different than the experience I have been in the circle with a round sung by multiple people there. The energy flow is different. The sense of holding and creating sacred space is different. All sorts of things.

Different isn’t always *better* - I can have fantastic experiences on my own, and fantastic experiences in groups (and, sometimes, lousy experiences in both settings.) But I find the difference brings a lot of benefit, just because I’m getting varied experiences.

The practical bits

There are also some practical ways that group ritual is different (and has beneficial differences in at least some cases.)

Make time: It’s sometimes easier to make time for something when it’s deliberately scheduled on your calendar and involves other people (so you need to prepare ahead of time, and there are more obvious consequences if you blow it off.) We’re more accountable. But it’s not just - at least for me - about making time to be there.

It’s also about making sure there’s time in my life to prepare for it. To get myself there, to prepare mentally for ritual. And, of course, these days, there’s also planning time for the ritual that needs to happen if the ritual’s going to take place.

Requiring myself to make that preparation time also oddly makes it *easier* for me to make personal time: I’ve got a better sense of what things I might want to focus on, work with, learn about, practice, or whatever else on my own. And, sometimes, an idea of what I don’t want to spend more time on right now. In other words, it helps me set priorities and goals in my personal work, by outlining some possibilities.

Articulate: Related to this, when we’re doing things with other people, we need to be able to articulate what we’re doing. Some of my best ritual designs are because I had to get out of how my own head works and come up with something that makes sense to people who do not live in my head. (Which is to say, everyone else.)

Feedback: Other people can give you continual feedback on what they see from you, and how to deal with problems or changes that come up. This can be frustrating at times, but it’s also a powerful learning opportunity.

New ideas: You often get to experience approaches you would never have thought to work with. The group I trained with rotated who designed full moon rituals among the initiates: it was fantastic to see how different people approached different topics, and what style of ritual they chose to do. It challenged me in ways that wouldn’t happen if I were working entirely on my own.

Support: You don’t have to do everything yourself. Seems logical, from the above points, but there are times when I’m really glad I don’t have to track everything going on in circle, and can just trust other people to do their bits, and get a rich and full experience. And, of course, in emotionally challenging rituals, you can get support from the other people there in doing deep and intense work.

Challenge: Perhaps my favorite. Now, I try very hard to be rigorous in evaluating what I do on my own. But I’ve found that working with other people requires me to challenge and develop my ideas and practices in a way even the most rigorous self-examination doesn’t always reach.

My current covenmate is a great example of this: I’ll poke at things over time, come up with something - and then she will, very clearly and precisely - ask me a bunch of questions that allow me to take it to the next level, or that make me look hard at certain assumptions. (She says I do the same for her: we’re a good fit for each other because we both find this incredibly useful and enjoyable.)

The only downside, so far as I can see, is that we have a very hard time having *short* conversations with each other.

[The following is something I've written up for internal coven documents, because I wanted to spell out what I thought my role was. I've run most of it by my covenmate, and included some other thoughts at her suggestion.]

Or, rather, I should say roles: I think there are a number of things going on here. To many people, the HPS is the one responsible for making sure the spiritual and religious stuff happens. At a basic level, there’s three parts to this, in my eyes: anchoring the spiritual core, providing direction, and making sure the practical details fall into place.

Anchoring the core:

No one group - no matter how fantastic, or how skilled the leadership – can be all things to all people. Part of creating the spiritual core is deciding what the core focus of the group will be – and what things are not on that group’s map, or are lesser parts of their work together. We have and must make choices. There are only 24 hours in the day.

Are we going to focus on being a working coven, with relationships developed over significant time? Or are we going to focus on training new witches? Are we going to focus on the use of music and dance in ritual, or something else? Are we going to be a small group, where everyone can fit around one table – or a larger community, with lots of people to talk to, but maybe less time to talk to each other one on one?

There isn’t one right answer here. While Phoenix Song is aiming at being a small working coven with a heavy emphasis on music and other arts in ritual, I deeply enjoyed my time in the group I trained in – what has now become a larger, enthusiastic training coven with many wonderful people.

Providing direction:

Rather than seeing or feeling energy, I ‘hear’ it – what you’d expect from a music major and composition geek. One thing that’s fascinated me since I started taking on various ritual roles is how the different roles sound to me.

Priestessing often sounds to me not like the melody (as you might assume), but like the bass line: the foundation that everyone else builds off of. Musically, these are things like what key and harmony we’re working within, or setting the pace we go at. Magically, It’s setting the basic functions, what possibilities might fit in the large cauldron of the song. As in music, everyone else gets some input – but we need to agree on some basic things, or it’s going to sound chaotic. And someone needs to make sure we’re all staying more or less on the same beat, and in the same key.

(Incidentally, I ‘hear’ the priest’s role as the melody: it is also crucial to the nature of the song, but it solidifies a particular line of potentials into something more clear-cut: it is a specific iteration, rather than the well of possibility. Consider also the elements of ‘conductor’ and ‘artistic director’ which are roles I think are more easily split by ritual leaders.)

There’s also the question of style. There are many types of music: most of us are good at some, but not all. The HPS who trained me, and who I love dearly, is such a Leo. She adores the shiny, and she radiates warmth and love and acceptance, and community simply by being there.

I tried, honestly, for about six months, to do what she did. It was always a struggle, always a constant effort. It was such an effort it got in the way of other important things. Details fell out of my head. I couldn’t relax and experience in ritual. By the end of six months, I could manage it for short periods, if I kept some of my concentration and focus on being open and welcoming in that style (and away from other needs). It never really got easier.

Me? I’m the water (and air) type. Where my former HPS is the fire at the center of the hearth, I’m the pool of water, or the well. I want to stand around it, and talk to you, and watch the dragonflies and the birds, and the ripples in the pool . Oh, but I want to talk. Talking to people, engaging the mind, is the way I best create and strengthen relationships. That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the quiet presence, or the simple touch, or other modes – but the one that’s easiest for, the one that’s instinctual, is what’s going on in my head, and what’s going on in your head, and which bits we want to share, and why they’re interesting and linked to this other interesting thing.

Part of my hiving, therefore, was realizing that to be the best priestess I could be, to do the things that called to me, I needed to be working in a different bass line, a different song. One song isn’t better than another – but some fit us more closely than others.

Practical details:

This is the simplest of the functions in theory, though complex in practice. When and where are we gathering? What do we need for this ritual? Is anyone going to be absent? What needs to happen in order for all the spiritual work to go forward? What training or experience or skills do people need to participate most fully?

The priestess is not the only one taking care of these details. Delegation (and healthy delegation) is critical here. But if the priestess is responsible for keeping the spiritual work on track, then she’s got to keep an eye on these things.

That said, there are some other important roles here.

Incluer:

One of my friends, Jo Walton, is an SF author who coined the word ‘incluing’. She uses it to describe the process by which you tell the reader about details of your created world in small ways, without ever sitting down and dumping information on them.

I’ve thought a lot about the implications for coven work. Imagine that someone walks into a group I’m leading, (often a new and sometimes strange culture for newcomers.) In this case, people look for context. They are going to look at how I behave, and at how people behave towards me. A lot of that, in some ways, is seeking incluing: they are looking for small cues and details that help put what I’m doing into some sort of context they understand.

Now, making assumptions based only on these clues can be a bit dangerous – you may misinterpret something, or assume something is more or less important than it actually is. But the basic idea remains: what I do, how I behave, how I set that bass line and tone and key for the group is going to echo out in ripple effects.

It’s my job as priestess – as one of the people who most clearly have direct influence on the nature of the group – to be as careful as possible to be aware of those interactions, of what information I’m putting out for other people to pick up. It’s not just what I say, or how I respond to someone – it’s also in my body language, in the pauses in my speech, in all sorts of unconscious details. It’s also in how things like a problematic comment by someone else is handled. Are they slapped down in public, or quietly redirected in a gentle way? Which one’s appropriate in that setting?

I am obviously imperfect at tracking many of these things. I’m human, after all. But I do keep an eye on it, and I do think it’s important.

The one person who can’t simply walk away:

In some ways, the priestess is the one person who absolutely can’t walk away without fundamental change. If, as noted above, she’s the one who sets the spiritual work in place (and in many traditions, you can function, if needed, without a priest, but not the other way round), then there’s a logical outgrowth.

Anyone else up to and arguably including the high priest of the group, can theoretically decide to go do something else. There will be consequences if they do, of course, depending on how they handle it. But fundamentally, they have an easier time walking away: it’s elements of harmony and variation on the melody, rather than deciding which song we’re singing together and setting the foundation.

This is not to say that priestesses are irreplaceable. We are replaceable.

First, there is no one true perfect priestess. And second, it’s obviously a good idea to have a backup in case of illness or other emergency. But it is to say that they’re not interchangeable: the fundamental experience is – and really, *should* be – different, depending on who is running ritual.

Priestess and the Gods:

When I sent the first draft of this to my covenmate, she pointed out that I hadn’t talked a lot about the actual ritual steps: does the priestess mediate between participants and the Gods? Is there some other role? In many witchcraft traditions, people are considered to be their own priests and priestesses when it comes to their relationship with the Gods. I strongly agree with that: there is an element of personal responsibility and interaction that I think it is crucial.

Ritual is song, ritual is theatre, ritual is art: my job as priestess is to make sure it happens, and to keep it going, but I think it’s up to everyone else there to share in keeping the song going, to step into the experience, and to see what they will take away from it this time. One person might make a decision, another might decide a hard conversation with a loved one is needed. Someone else might feel comforted or enfolded. A fourth person may feel nudged to try something new. Very different answers, but all from the same basic situation.

That goes for people’s interactions with the Gods as well: my greatest hope is that I will help create and hold spaces where that happens regularly – but whether it does is not just about what I do, but about what other participants in the ritual do. I want to help – and Gods know, I will offer advice and analysis and theory discussion at the drop of a hat. But I also don’t have all the answers. I’d much rather help people figure out how to find them on their own.

Outside of ritual:

The other question my excellent covenmate asked me was about what happens outside of ritual.

I have this theory: inside of ritual, you may have different people than usual taking on specific ritual roles (priestess or priest for a given ritual, act as handmaiden or summoner, Draw Down, etc.) all of which depend on lots of other factors. In the training-centered group I hived from, this is an obviously important part of training.

But likewise, the HPS and HP over the overall group set a lot of the tone for group interaction outside of ritual. Done well, this creates a welcoming and thoughtful and caring space. Done poorly, people can feel left out, as the currents of the ritual group swirl around them, or even attacked or scapegoated. All of these things spill over into ritual: we are constantly changed and affected by our lives, and what happens in a coven meal after ritual is certainly part of that, no less than the ritual itself.

So, boiling this down, I feel I, as high priestess (and shared with the group’s high priest), am responsible for:

1) Setting the guidelines for the space:

I’m a big fan of the Greek idea of xenia or the guest/host relationship. In that, both sides have benefits – but they also have specific responsibilities. In all communities, there are some things that are utterly unacceptable, a lot of things that are iffy but possibly okay, and a bunch of things that are just fine. Some of these are big – murder, abuse. They’re obvious.

But many are small. How do you get into a conversation if people are talking rapidly and energetically without interrupting? Is it rude to correct a factual error someone’s made, or polite? (I spend time in communities where each of these is true.)

The trick is that the standards in Pagan settings are not always the same as in other places we spend time. I believe it’s part of the HPS’s job to help set the standards, and then to make sure the community standards are held to (as well as modeling and explaining them to new folks as needed.) I think everyone else in the community has responsibility for the group culture, as well, but it’s important to set the tone.

2) For generally modeling how I’d like people in the coven to treat each other

Beyond the above, I also think there are models of behavior. Someone studying, seeking to go through initiatory experiences, is often reshaping many of the ways they see the world. It’s important while that process is going on to have models to work from.

I thought a lot about this while I was in the process of getting divorced. I ended up talking a lot with several friends and acquaintances who’d been divorced, and looking at how people I respected and whose opinions I valued helped me handle some things better, and to deal with bouts of misery far more easily.

3) For setting the tone before and after ritual

I believe that a ritual event doesn’t just begin when we all form up in a circle, and end with the ‘merry meet and merry part and merry meet again’. It also begins when we’re setting up, when we’re talking beforehand, when we’re clearing things away, when we’re eating.

Phoenix Song has already made some steps in this direction: we’ve deliberately simplified our set-up so that it’s easy and stress-free for us, so we can focus on the details if we wish, but don’t feel overwhelmed. But it also can mean everything from drawing people out and asking questions, to making sure everyone gets a chance to speak. (This is, incidentally, the part I’m probably most nervous about.)

4) For making sure that people in crisis have a reliable, thoughtful, competent source to turn to if something goes wrong.

I don’t think that always has to be the HPS or HP: certainly it may make sense for someone to turn to a mentor, or to a covenmate with specific experience. But because all of these things come back into ritual eventually, if we’re doing this right, I do think the HPS and HP need to be aware of major concerns, etc. to balance and adjust appropriately in the planning.

This is a work in progress: there things I don’t know how I want to handle yet, because they haven’t come up in that specific way. On the other hand, I think this is a fairly clear idea of what I see my role as being – and how I see it playing out. The key with much of this is not about dictating something, or demanding something – but about being the kind of person that people who want that kind of space want to be around. Being that person consistently, even if I’m stressed or tired or crabby.

This is true of everyone, naturally. Just, the ripple effects are more obvious when there’s a clear group attached. What I do always has consequences, and the more I’m attentive to that, the better.

It’s also, of course, something that changes over time. The steps that are most important right now, when there are two of us looking at adding new people, are different than where we’ll be focusing (I hope!) in a few years with a stable small group who’ve worked together for a while. Which is the final role, I think: adapting gracefully and maturely to change.

A dicussion elsewhere online got me thinking about limits. The specific question was “What happens if you get a prospective coven member who is allergic to pets, and you have pets?” and it got me thinking.

First, some background:
I used to live in my covenstead, post divorce. I’m very grateful for that, because it was a very good option at the time - but I was already having some ongoing allergy issues when they added another dog. (to a household of 5 cats and then 2 dogs: I’m much more allergic to dogs than cats, and my cat lived in my room with the door closed and an air filter running constantly.)

At this point, I have a hard time spending more than 2-3 hours there before the allergies kick in, even if I’m medicated. Once they kick in, it impacts not only that evening, but my sleep (wheezing in bed? Not good for sleep quality) and my ability to function the next day (the thing I resent most about asthma is how it takes my brain away.)

Do I blame them? Nope, though once they made that decision, I did move out pretty promptly. I miss spending time with them, and I dislike the fact I can’t just hang out up there easily. But I also fully understand that it’s their home, and their love for their pets, and that these are good things (and values I also hold.)

So, going at it from the HPS side, now (where I still have one cat), here’s my take on it.

1) I have existing, long-standing commitments to my cat

When I adopted her from the humane society, I made a specific commitment to take care of her for the rest of her life. What kind of witch would I be if I broke those very deliberate commitments for anyone (never mind someone who might or might not work out) just because those commitments were now less than ideal in a particular way?

2) On a practical level, it’s not like there’s a shortage of cats.

My beloved furball is 9, far above the usual adoptable age. If I did take her back to the humane society, she’d almost certainly be put down very quickly. I love her. I don’t want that to happen.

3) The loss rate for potential students can be quite high:

In the group I trained in, at least half the people who express more than a cursory interest (i.e. enough to get invited to an open ritual) don’t pan out as long-term students. At what point does one get rid of one’s pets to accommodate a student? And what happens if you have years of students not having issues with pets, and then one person who does?

In the group I trained with, out of 30 people (over 7 years) who were prospective students, only one has had major issues with the covenstead pets (besides me, and that developed over time). That’s a pretty low ratio, all things considered. Should people change their lives for one person? For a less than 4% chance, based on past history?

4) My own well-being and happiness.

I’m single. Some days, the only tactile input I get from other living beings is from the cat. (I have a number of friends I hug regularly, but I don’t see them every day.)

I’m fairly certain I had less trouble post-divorce than many people do because I still had regular tactile input (there’s some interesting research out there about this, too - there’s all sorts of internal body systems regulation that works better with regular touch.)

Beyond that: witchcraft does not require martyrdom. There is no requirement for me to give up pleasure that might not be someone else’s choice that is not directly harming people. That kind choice is going to depend on a lot of other factors, many of them very situationally dependent.

Likewise, as a now-HPS, I set needed limits in my own space: people are not welcome to bring their pets with them (both for my cat’s well-being, and to reduce further allergens), and I’d have a really hard time with a student who was a smoker and who’d need to smoke (even outside) during our time together: I’m sensitive enough to smoke sometimes that I don’t want it brought into my living space on someone’s clothes or hair.

Is that going to mean I turn down some potential students? Probably. Is that the end of the world for me or them? No. Is it easy? Also no. But sometimes the necessary things aren’t.

Are there also times I’d consider alternatives? Quite likely, yes. But I wouldn’t make unalterable changes (like getting rid of a pet): I’d look for solutions (meeting elsewhere, exploring other medication options, doing some work by phone or online rather than meeting in person all the time) that could be easily reversed if a particular student with concerns didn’t work out. And I’d also want to be extra sure (once I start going out of my way for someone) that I was fairly sure they *would* work out - taking more time with conversation to make sure someone was a really solid fit in other ways.

It’s one of the things I’ve kept in mind when looking at how I’d like to handle prospective new members.

As some of you might know, I’m also a casual World of Warcraft player (I play on Hellscream, and like playing priests. Hypatia - Disc/Holy - is almost level 62, and Thalassa - Shadow - is 32 right now).

I read posts on the WoWInsider site regularly (they’re a good fit for my interests), and my attention got caught by a comment on this post.

First: should anyone find this post via my referencing the WoWInsider link

Hi! Part of why I’m a (very) casual WoW player is that most of my spare time and energy goes to my religious life, specifically something close enough to Wicca for most people’s purposes. I’m in the process of forming my own ritual group after several years of training and work in another group, and this blog is about a lot of that process. Feel free to ask questions: I’ll answer anything that’s not outright insulting or abusive.

That said, almost everything I do gets funneled back into the religious work somehow - especially group dynamics and interaction concepts, which are a major interest of mine.

A quick guide for non-online gamers
Many of these games have guilds (or some similar term) that are formed for all sorts of reasons - social interaction, but also to take on larger challenges in the game world. In World of Warcraft, a significant amount of endgame content requires at least 25-40 characters to do, thus at least that many individual people.

I’m in a small, informal guild of longtime friends (it’s my chance to spend social time with friends from the East Coast), but almost all of them are associated with a larger raiding guild that plays endgame content regularly. I don’t have time for that, but I happily putter around the edges and do things when they have time, and chat, and so on.

Back to that post…
The comment that particularly caught me was Rational’s comment (the first one) where he/she says: “Sadly, guilds are tiny. They can’t afford to have someone vet new recruits.”

Which made me go “Hmm.” Because, after all, your average coven is not large (far smaller than your average raiding guild), and this is something that most covens do as a matter of practice (and, in fact, can’t afford *not* to do). I wanted to explore it the parallels a bit. What do I see?

1.) You need to know you have enough in common.

Not everyone is going to fit into every guild. And not everyone will be a fit for every coven. Finding out some things early helps a lot in wear and tear on *everyone* involved (applicant and existing group members alike.)

• Do you want to do the same things?
• Are you available at the same times?
• Do you have compatible approaches to getting things done and communicating?
• Do you have enough goals in common?

There are obviously many variations - a guild, for example, is going to care a lot more about whether a particular person fits a specific in-game need than a coven is likely to. (And be more willing, probably, to take a chance on someone who fills a major need.) But the basic questions? Still really useful.

2.) You need some kind of process.

It can be elaborate, but it doesn’t have to be. A lot of guilds use a simple online questionnaire, followed by a face to face interview and a trial period. My first experience with something like this was applying to Harper Hall on PernMUSH way back when (1995), which used pretty much exactly that method. (More on that below.)

In many cases where the cost if someone doesn’t work out is not huge, this is a perfectly workable system. You can give someone an initial (often limited) membership, and as they demonstrate they’re reliable and competent, they get more responsibility/access/resources (very common in gaming situations).

Covens tend to be far more involved processes, because the costs are much higher if you get it wrong. If you’re inviting people to your home, you want to make sure that they’re not going to abuse that or become stalkers or anything like that. But even then, it’s not all that hard for one or two people to be the ‘front’ people for the process, and bring others into it only once they’ve weeded out people who are obviously unsuitable.

Most important part of the process? Know what you’re looking for. The more specific you are about what you’re seeking, the more important your process design is. If you’re fairly flexible, you can generally weed out the people who’d be a dismal fit with a few simple questions, try everyone else out, and go from there.

3.) Your front person or people need to enjoy what they’re doing.

I get a huge kick out of reading initial contacts/applications. I have for years. I’m fascinated by what people share about themselves, how they phrase it, and how they approach the questions that a group asks.

It’s much better to have someone like me doing the initial read through (assuming they’re competent) than someone who hates doing it: someone who thinks it’s a necessary evil that gets in the way of the stuff they would rather be doing will procrastinate, grumble, and otherwise drag their feet eventually (and burn out) and that’s no good for anyone.

4.) Your initial contact person has to have a good idea what their job is.

Is it their job to weed out certain things? Be really clear what those things are. Is spelling a big deal for the whole group, or just a pet issue of the gatekeeper?

Be clear what the next step is. In some groups, the initial contact point just passes everything (except the truly misguided apps) along. In others, they do several more steps - checking to see if requirements are met, or even an initial interview to make sure the applicant and group are on the same page, before passing along someone as a serious possibility.

5.) Backups are your friend.

If you’re dealing with a lot of applications, or there’s a chance your gatekeeper may disappear (even for the best of reasons), it’s good to have a backup. Again, limit your failure mode. In online settings, this usually means the officers (or guild leader, or whoever) also having access, even if they rarely or never use it.

(In coven situations, this is much less of an issue: if someone is that seriously out of contact, you generally know where they live and what’s going on, and so on.)

6.) Finding the right process makes everything easier.

It’s easy to over-engineer it: to make it very complex or have lots of steps, or add bells and whistles. (I have temptations this way myself.) The problem is, it doesn’t always improve things.

My solution is to look at the process, and ask myself: “What am I looking for with this question?”. Not “What should their answer be.” but “What am I trying to learn.” - they’re two different things. Figuring out your best questions for what you really want can save your time, your applicant’s time, and everyone’s energy.

Let’s compare a couple of variations. If I want to know what someone’s goals are for their time with a group, I can ask that in several ways.

If I ask

What are you looking for in a group/guild/whatever right now?

I’ll probably get a list of goals or desires or intentions. This may be all I need, and if the rest of the application is short and simple, this may be fine. But what happens if I ask something different? If I ask:

After reading our website/info, what makes you particularly interested in us at this time?

Most people will answer that with something about their goals - but you also will quickly weed out anyone who hasn’t actually looked at the information you’ve already provided. In a longer more complex application, this can be a great way to combine questions, and it’s also a great way to sort things out if you’ve had a recent history of people not reading provided info (and that’s particularly important to you.) There are other ways to get at this kind of information, too.

7.) Consider length and commitment.

I tend to think that the initial questionnaire should take 10-60 minutes to fill out (depending on how tightly you want to filter your applicants). Much shorter than 10 minutes, and people won’t take it seriously or will do it on a lark (which wastes the time of the people who respond.) Too long, and most people won’t bother, even people who might be a good fit.

I think most game/fun/hobby related forms should take most people 10-30 minutes to fill out initially. (Not including background/informational reading, etc.) On the other hand, I’m aiming for the initial coven questions to take about an hour. One of the things I’m deliberately sorting for is people who are sure enough we might be a fit that they’re willing to spend that time. That said, it might need adjustments down the road…

8.) Refine the process:

Once you’ve had a few people go through the process, see what works. If you point 50 people at the application, and only one submits it, you’re probably doing something wonky somewhere - maybe the page is glitched, or it’s way too long, or it’s unreadable, or something else. Look at it closely yourself. *Do* it yourself, for that matter: it can give you a good sense of how long it takes.

Also, as you get applicants over time, look and see how the patterns shift. Some patterns may change as the surrounding environment shifts and changes. Others may mean that you want to adapt your process. If you find that you weed out a lot of people on your first person-to-person chat, maybe you want to do that first, and then have them submit an application for everyone else to review.

Some examples:

I’m still working out the details for my shiny new coven application - but I know it’s going to be a pretty detailed process, and it needs a lot of fine-tuning.

Why? Because we’re talking about a small group (probably no more than 8-10 people total) who will be meeting in people’s homes for significant amounts of time and doing emotionally intimate work together. Any one person we take potentially bars other people in future, so we want to make sure that we find the right fit. Also, any changes in the group affect the whole group significantly.

On the other end of the spectrum is something like what I did on PernMUSH (a text-based role-playing game set in Anne McCaffrey’s Pern universe). When I took over as Masterharper, we’d been getting a bunch of really lousy applications from people. (Lousy how? Badly written, showing little understanding of the game world, with assumptions that would limit or mess with other people’s enjoyment, etc.)

Often, the people who did bad applications disappeared 2 weeks later, having taken up a lot of time and energy (from their interviewer and the masters discussing the application) with no real benefit for anyone. That leads to burnout.

The revised version worked like this: we started with a 5 question application in email. This showed us:

• Whether they could read the background information we provided in multiple forms.
• Whether they follow basic directions/instructions.
• Whether they were familiar with the game world and setting, or could work around what they didn’t yet know.
• Whether they paid some attention to the application (we wouldn’t rule someone out for a couple of typos, but constant spelling issues or incomprehensible writing are a big deal on a text-based game.)
• Whether they cared enough about this particular goal to spend a little bit of time (maybe an hour for most people) on an application: an hour is a tiny percentage of the amount of time they’d spend with us as a player.

Once they submitted that (and assuming it wasn’t totally impossible), they’d also have an in-game, in-character interview, so we could see how they role-played and fit in with existing events in the game spaces.

What did we ask? Again, we were open to a wide number of play styles, types of focus, and interests, but focused on a particular goal in the game (a particular profession, more or less), and a specific in-game community. So we asked questions that would help us figure out whether someone would fit with that.

We were willing to push the time demands for the application a little higher because knowing the setting and enjoying working with words were important aspects of long-term fun (both for them, and for the people playing with them.) Also - while I’m still pretty pleased with these, or I wouldn’t be referencing them, I wouldn’t approach it in quite the same way now (10 years down the road, with far more group experience.)

1) Please tell us something about your character’s background. (Example: Who is your character, where is s/he from, what does s/he want from life, and why)

Goal of the question: Character background is the overt question, but we also wanted to know if they could give us a rounded idea of their character without being asked each and every detail. (Do they need to have their hand held all the way, in other words.)

In Warcraft, I might ask something like “How is your character currently specced, and why?”. In a Pagan group setting, I might ask “Tell me about your religious path to this point.” or even, basically. “What’s your background so far?”

2) Why does your character want to be a Harper? What IC skills and interests does s/he bring to the Hall.

Goal: To weed out the people who said “I’m just curious.” or “I’ve done everything else, why not Harper?”. Sometimes those people worked out - but we’d had a whole run of applications where they hadn’t. Asking people to put in a little thought about what their character’s goals and motivations were solved the problem tidily. In a guild setting, this might be similar to ”

In Warcraft, you might ask “What interests you about [focus of guild].” Or in Pagan settings, “Why this group?” or “Why are you seeking training right now?” or “What do you want from your path in the near future?”

3) In your opinion, what role does Harper Hall play, both in Pernese society and within PernMush as a game?

Goal: To see how comfortable they were with the game setting, and whether they could discuss it briefly. If someone couldn’t answer this one, we’d want to do a lot more talking with them before accepting them.

In Warcraft terms, this is similar to “What does your class/spec do well?” and “How do you feel about doing that?” In Pagan settings, questions like “What have you read?” or “How do you define Pagan/Wiccan/witch/etc.” often get at the same kinds of questions.

4) Do you have IC ties to anywhere on the game? Is your character involved in a romantic relationship? (Weyrmating, engaged, etc)

Goal: Are there any in-character relationships we need to adjust for/work around/might cause some issues for in-game reasons?

This one has less application in Warcraft, but variants apply in my religious life - if someone’s romantic partner doesn’t approve of their study, that can get hairy.

5) Do you have a regular online schedule? About how much time do you expect to be on as this character?

Goal: Basic logistics. And pretty self-explanatory: if someone can’t work on the same schedule as the group, you’re going to have problems. (Broadly applicable, too!)

Also, how much time is this person willing to commit to this? Does that mesh with their goals? With the group’s requirements? (You will likely need to play this by ear in places: someone may say what they think you want to hear, only to struggle with showing up that often once the honeymoon phase is over.)

6) What OOC knowledge might you bring to the game and the Hall? (For example: Have you read the Harper Hall trilogy? Do you play a musical instrument or sing RL? Are you familiar with the PernMush news and +info files? Are you familiar with the Harper information in particular?)

Goal: To find out if there’s any other non-game-specific knowledge that might benefit our shared fun. There’s also a certain amount of work involved with running any group: if someone has interests that’d make that easier, I like knowing early on. Again, not required for membership, but it often meant we could phrase explanations in a clearer way, or let them run with some idea more easily after a brief discussion.

This type of question is less relevant in something like Warcraft (where you’re pretty centered on the game action together) but you could ask about what sites they use for information, or something similar. Shared hobbies/interests/familiarity can make a difference in coven life (though it depends heavily on the group.)

Summary:

As you can probably see, once you actually get the system set up, it’s relatively easy to maintain it and adjust it quickly - but you need to invest a little time up front. My experience, though, is that once you do that, it really *is* very easy to keep up. You get instant rewards in both how quickly you can review applications - and, often, in the quality of applications you get in the first place.

You don’t need to be stuffy or toss an application for every minor thing - but how they answer questions or approach an application can tell you a lot about their overall approach to learning new things, interacting with people they don’t know well, or how they pursue goals that matter to them.

We’ve been talking, in terms of group work, about how to handle things like food allergies.

Why relevant?
Food allergies are relevant in a couple of ways.

1. We share some kind of food and drink in ritual.Generally, this is bread and wine (or mead, or maybe beer or ale), but generally alcohol. I generally make the bread, which uses white flour (wheat based). I’ve done cornbread, but I haven’t experimented with gluten-free baking (and because of the relative expense of the necessary ingredients and storage issues in a tiny kitchen, don’t anticipate doing so, honestly, on any kind of regular basis.)
2. We make a point of shared food after ritual.Good food and drink is actually an explicit value of the group, and we like paying attention to where our food comes from, seasonality, and other details like that. Currently, we’re just planning a shared meal (as it’s a little weird to do potluck with 2 people) - you’ve seen the photos of our Ostara meal. Our new moon meal last weekend involved cold roast chicken (roasted that afternoon), herb bread, baked mushrooms, salad, and oatmeal cookies, along with wine.

The trick is, people have food allergies. In our previous group work, we’ve seen everything from people who can eat anything, but who show up with a bag of chips, to people who can only eat 2 or 3 very specific foods - and the people who (despite being prompted twice beforehand) don’t mention they have food allergies until 2 minutes before ritual.

Clearly, we want a way to handle all of these competing issues in a way that is sane for us, and sufficiently healthy for others. Equally obviously “Do you have any food or other allergies” is a necessary part of our pre-ritual questions for guests.

Ritual food:
I have two major goals for ritual food.

1. That we do our best to come up with an in-ritual food alternative that they can have at the same time.For example, we might have alternate chalice with juice or water for those who don’t drink alcohol, or a small bowl of apple slices for someone who is gluten intolerant.
2. That the alternate be appropriate to the season and ritual.My preference for this is to talk to them in advance, figure out an alternative they can eat (by running through some options) and provide it in the same way we provide the bread. (Either I provide it, or whoever does has it ready to go when they arrive.) This reduces pre-ritual fussing. If that’s not possible (their diet is so restricted they need really specific foods), then I’d ask them to bring what made the most sense.

Advance warning:
Obviously, this means they have to let me know in advance - so “Do you have any food allergies or other medical needs” is high on the list of things to ask when inviting a guest.

That said, I’ve seen more than one situation where people have been told clearly they need to let people know about allergies - and not mentioned it until they show up in ritual. This leads to my own personal policy:

If you don’t tell me at least 24 hours in advance of ritual (barring truly last minute changes) of an issue, I’m not going to run around trying to accommodate it by running out to the store, trying to find an alternative in the cupboard, an appropriate size bowl to put it in, etc. It’s important to me that the immediately pre-ritual time be as calm as possible.

If someone doesn’t tell me, they still have options - the most obvious being to simply bow their head over the food and drink to acknowledge the blessing. Again, I’m not expecting them to know they need to mention it: I’m just expecting they’ll tell me when asked, or cope with the consequences of not doing so.

Post-ritual feasting:
My current favorite phrase for this is ‘additive, not restrictive’.

In other words, if you can’t eat something, but it will not cause you physical harm to be in the same room with it, then other people may bring it. And, of course, if it will be unhealthy for you to be in the same room, we want to avoid it.

On the other hand, if it’s just something you can’t eat (but can be around) or just don’t like, we will do our best to make sure there are at least 2-3 foods that any given person can eat. And if we have people with restricted food choices even from what’s there, perhaps that they get first dibs at the food in the very sensible tradition of alt.polycon’s Decadent Brunch.

L and I do not have food allergy issues, but all three of the guests for our Beltane have foods they can’t eat or shouldn’t have. I just sent out the email for that, which is somewhat complex (because it includes both “Don’t bring at all” lists and “Here’s specifics for stuff that must be carefully labelled/someone can’t have” but at the same time, means people can see for themselves whether something will work (and know who to contact in case of questions. I believe this will work - update when we get past May 3rd.

General theory of ritual food:
As it says in one of my info-documents-in-draft: “If you bring a bag of chips, you may be teased.”

There is encouragement to bring ‘real’ food (few preservatives, perhaps from the local area/your garden/the farmer’s market/other sustainable sources.) I can’t always afford to do what I did for the New Moon, and spring for a free-range no-hormone chicken to roast (or the equivalent) for all my food needs, but I do try hard to do so for ritual and post-ritual foods. There are a surprising number of inexpensive but filling post-ritual options (must do a post about those, too.)

That said, people have different resources - money, time to cook, ability to get to local markets. I would be quite happy with almost anything *except* “I stopped by the gas station on the way here and got a bag of chips” (which shows lack of forethought). Even a deli salad or fresh fruit (assuming it’s seasonally appropriate) makes a lot more sense.

My real concern is that people are thinking about it somewhat in advance, and trying to find something that will be lovely and suitable for the day. (i.e. bring a food you yourself will enjoy, and that is not served miserably out of season. Supermarket tomatoes in winter are an okay ingredient, but they shouldn’t be served like you’d serve a heirloom tomato warm from somone’s garden in the summer - which, okay, needs very little help or additional preparation, in my book. Maybe a little basil and olive oil. Mmm.)

You get the idea, I hope - it’s mostly about attention to what you bring, and how you wrap that into the total ritual experience, for me. There are many paths to that goal.

I just had what will be my last Sabbat (for a while, anyway) with the group I’ve been working with since 2001. That makes today a good time to talk more about Plan A and Plan B (and Plan Riff Until Ready)

Everyone in the group I’ve worked with since 2001 knows I’m hiving: it’s something I feel strongly called to do. I’ve talked about that recently.

There’s only one problem.

I have no earthly idea *where* my next job is going to be.Which is why my “I’m hiving” practical steps get a little tricky.

Short practical digression on jobs:

I got my Master’s in Library and Information Science last August. This means I’m currently seeking a new job that requires the degree, and that will let me do more of the library stuff that I want to do professionally. (I’ve been working as a library paraprofessional since 2000) Divorce was not kind to my finances, so there are also some practical aspects. MLIS-degreed librarians are not highly paid (compared to the amount of education required), but paraprofessionals are even less so.

My fondest desire is to find a professional library job that is otherwise what I want in the Twin Cities metro (or at least ‘evening driving distance’ to it.) I wouldn’t have to move, I could keep doing wonderful things with local friends, and life would be excellent.

The reality is, though, that it’s an awfully competitive job market for MLIS holders - there simply aren’t that many jobs in the area, and there are a lot of applicants for each one. (Not only do we have a library school in the Twin Cities, but there are also schools in Chicago, Madison, and Milwaukee, all of which have a number of grads who want to stay within driving distance of parents or extended family.) I’ve done better than average in my job searches so far (a finalist for a competitive position I didn’t get late last fall, and getting my current one-month temporary job.)

But the long-term permanent thing I get might be anywhere: I’m mostly looking within a 3-5 hour driving radius of the Twin Cities (close enough I can come back for a long weekend or special event, at least), but might be further.

This makes hiving complicated.

I obviously don’t want to make commitments that I may have to break due to a rapid job change (some of the jobs I’m applying for now start next academic school year. Some would start sooner.) My plans for the last year have all been contingent on “Assuming I don’t get a job that requires me to move”. (This is not fun. I am a creature of habit, so it’s also quite stressful.)

At the same time, I know myself: I do a lot better when I have thought ahead to various options, and made starting points for plans with them. I can’t cover everything, but I’m much happier when I’ve hit the high points or most likely demands.

This leads to plan A and plan B.

Plan A: Staying more or less local

(by which I mean a 45-60 minute driving time to the Twin Cities)

My plan in this case looks something like this:

Who:
As I’ve mentioned, one of my current covenmates is very willing to work with me. She wants the additional experience, is interested in what I want to explore, but is not interested right now in long-term group leadership. This suits us both great: we have in mind a short-term renewable agreement about what we do, and lots of chances to adapt as things change and grow.

I’ve talked a little bit about our immediate plans (until we know where I’m going to end up), but after that, plan A looks a bit like this…

Immediate future:

• If we have not finished with the ‘try this out, see if it works’ type of rituals that I want to do, finish those. This includes figuring out deities to work with, for complicated reasons (explained below).
• Do some work inviting periodic guests to ritual, to work with a slightly larger group.
• Come up with a ‘how do we determine new members’ sort of policy.
• Figure out what I want to do about training/teaching.

If I stay local, there’s an obvious other core of people in the tradition to talk to easily, and work with, and some of whom might possibly also want to work with the new group. There’s also a potential for Seekers in our current Seeker classes who want a different style/focus than my originating group. (Argh. I am going to have to come up with a way to do references that I’m happy with.)

My goals for the first year (once we know I’m staying):

• Be established in a pattern of rituals that provides a reasonably solid cycle, but that is open for further exploration and potential change.
• Have done work with L and with other guests, sufficient to be fairly sure we have a solid foundation for future work - i.e. solid ritual set-up established, experimentation with different kinds of ritual, work with a small ritual setting, etc.
• Be in a position to consider new group members, both from within the tradition, and new students from outside it. (With the intention of keeping the group small, focused, and limited.) I don’t necessarily want to take lots of new members, but I want to have a process in place for that when it becomes useful.
• Be able to host and/or put on a ritual for my originating group, for a taste of a different style.

Plan B:

Plan B involves moving. Therefore, there’s a whole set of other things that are needful. For one thing, since the tradition I work in is strictly local to the Twin Cities, moving anywhere else means teaching people the tradition before going too much further.

Before move:

• Work with L as much as possible to try out new things while I have someone to work with.
• Get all necessary documentation/files from the existing group (initiation rituals, etc. that we know need to stay constant.)
• Avoid panic

Move + 3 months:

• Get settled in my new place - all the unpacking, figuring out where things are, and getting settled in a new job sorts of things.
• Begin getting familiar with the local Pagan community, wherever it is - attending any networking events, open rituals, etc. to get a feel for what’s there, and what common practices are. This, of course, assumes there is a visible Pagan community, though that’s more likely (given my job interests) than the alternatives.
• See if I can arrange conversations with any group leaders/organizers/etc. over coffee - I’d much rather not step on anyone’s toes. I’d approach this with a “I’d love to hear about what you’re doing, and what you see a need for here” and a “If I did some of the stuff in the 6 months column, would that step on anyone’s toes?” (this is a 3-9 months sort of project).

6-12 months there:

• Look at some kind of activity that would let me quietly establish me in the community. This might include:
  • Volunteering for local events.
  • Attending local public events.
  • Offering an intro/101 type course.
  • Offering a reading/study group discussion type course.
  • Offering classes in areas of my particular interest (research and Paganism, music, etc.)
• Work on creating a teaching curriculum and pre-planning rituals or segments of rituals for later use (because the next year will be *busy*)

12-24 months:

• Around a year there, start looking at being open for new students/members - quiet advertising, etc.
• My preference is to grow it out of a short intro-101 type class or a book/study group (i.e. the “See what gels” sort of approach.)
• Begin doing ritual work with people who seem like a possible fit (on the “Let’s try each other out” sort of scale.)
• Toward the end of the 2nd year, hopefully have a core group of people to work with, even if they would likely not be initiates in the tradition yet.