One Word: Discernment
Vital to a spiritual life...
Inspired by Seo Helrune’s response to Irene Glass’ yearly request for a word for the year.
This is mine: Discernment.
Discernment in the Data Overload
We have entered a world in which it is more needed, more dire than ever, that we exercise discernment.
What we take in can be scraped, compromised, regurgitated, and in some cases, erroneously repeated as truth by LLMs (Large Language Models). We have “AI authors” pumping out literally impossible amounts of “books” into the public book spaces that can mimic others’ works. We have “AI” voice and video getting better with each iteration with mimicking human speech and visuals. The days of multiple fingers and linked elbow-knee joints as tells for AI generated images are swiftly becoming a thing of the past as the algorithms and programs get better and better at mimicking actual art. The em dash (it looks like this: —this) as a recognizable tell for AI generated text is going to disappear if things keep improving at the rate they have been.
People are increasingly treating LLM chatbots as oracular devices and even as independent vættir. They are working with chatbots in this way, or as would-be therapists, divulging their deepest and darkest secrets to a program hooked into surveillance software that is taking in their information and packaging it to other companies. LLMs and scam artists are scraping the video, audio, and image output from real artists, engineers, and musicians and claiming it as their own.
TikTok and Instagram are lousy with scams, cold readings, and folks trying to build personality cults. In the years I have been part of the Pagan and Heathen communities, 22 as a Pagan and 20 as a Heathen, the venues change but the issues we have to tackle remain the same. We need discernment in our communities as much as we ever have.
None of this is to say that we had it easier in separating ice cream from bullshit in the past. Those library cards did not give us any more inherent discernment than someone looking something up on Wikipedia today. What we were taught, however, was how to digest and discern information so we could be clear that what we were taking in was authentic.
The willingness to read, listen, and watch with a critical eye is necessary. No small amount of online kerfuffles I have been watching lately, especially in leftist spaces, could be easily dealt with if folks actually read beyond the headlines and had parsed sourcing for the headlines they did read. Then there is the treatment of personality and projection as if they are the authentic reading of a situation, rather than the content of what someone has read or put out. The amount of leftists repeating right-wing talking points would be shocking if it were not predictable by now.
We live in an era where ‘flooding the zone’ (thanks Breitbart News) and rhetoric over substance have become dominant forms of communication. Evaluating who we listen to, how, and evaluating where even trusted sources for our news, ideas, and religious communities get their information is sorely needed. I do not want any reader, student, or loved one taking everything I have to say at face value. Sometimes I get references wrong. I misremember. I am wrong at times. When I am not doing those things, sometimes what I have to say simply does not apply to a given reader, listener, community member, or loved one.
We are just coming out of a time when “Never again the Burning Times” as a rallying cry is dying. We are coming out of a time when “4,000,000 women died in the Burning Times” is understood as historically innaccurate. We are at a place where more of us understand well and truly that Ishtar has nothing to do with Eostre or Easter. How did Wicca and Paganism let go over the overblown claims to the unbroken matriarchal cult from antiquity to now? Because some of its chief proponents died and academia got better at providing facts to the public, and the public got better at taking that information in, learning from it, and spreading it. More of us became recognized scholars, and those of that did not did not let our zeal get in the way of our facts.
We are able to discern. Our communities have the ability, wisdom, and experience to apply it well not only to historical events, but also to our religious discourse, experiences, and leadership. It is my hope and my belief that we will continue to exercise that discernment well with the torrent of LLM slop, disinformation, and misinformation at our doors. It is my hope that we will apply good discernment to our experiences, ideas, beliefs, and understanding of how things work, building up healthier communities in doing that work.
Discernment in Direct Experience
The first line of discernment I teach folks is spiritual hygiene. Why? Spiritual hygiene is cleansing, grounding, centering, and shielding/warding. Spiritual hygiene teaches what ways you take spiritual information in, process it, and what happens with the experience has passed. Spiritual hygiene is intentionally engaging with filters around spiritual phenomena. You engage these filters on your own terms. They allow you approach spiritual phenomena cleanly, from an even keel, with clear understanding of what you want to do, and to set boundaries around the experiences you do and do not want to have.
When it comes to direct experience, allowing myself to experience what I am going to experience and then analyzing it later has been deeply helpful. It allows me to engage in the richness of a spiritual experience while not being so swept away with it that I lose the ability to discern what it was I experienced. Giving time to absorb what there is to be absorbed from the experience and not immediately telling others about it helps me to figure out my own head about a given experience. Sometimes a given experience is just for me, and only makes sense in my context. Still, critically thinking about and reckoning with my experiences is a needed part of integrating them into my spiritual life.
While spiritual hygiene and critical thinking will not fix all of our communities’ woes, it would go a way to addressing our communities getting hijacked by bad actors. One idea I keep seeing floated as a solution here is that if we just removed as many people as possible between ourselves and the Ginnreginn then we simply would not have these issues. I think that this is a notion that can only make sense in a hyper-individualist society where folks look to no one but themselves for guidance. It only makes sense in spiritual communities where we have no trusted Elders, experts, or that trust is so abandoned that we only trust the connection of ourselves and our own experiences. Being able to talk with others who are informed by experience and understand what it is I have experienced helps to discern and troubleshoot. Clearly, we need more trusted people and not less. We need more experts with lived experiences rather than armchair theory.
Directions of Discernment
The personal and communal discernment I have touched on here go hand-in-hand, and requires both individuals and the communities they exist within to practice discernment. Discernment in who is trusted, what becomes a communal value vs a personal view, and what is passed on are all part of this unfolding within and through community. Part of this is the right mindset. Orthodoxy is a word often said in polytheist and animist circles with clenched teeth and hisses. However, right thinking is the opposite side of the coin rather than the polar opposite of orthopraxy. Without right thought there cannot be right action. Without right action right thought lacks impact and lived meaning.
What we allow into our bodies, minds, and souls, matters. How it comes in, sets up space within us, whether ideas or experiences, whether lessons or mysteries matters. I do believe that generally, the Mysteries keep themselves. What is within our power to control is why, how, and when we approach a given Being, place, or thing.
Even in the directions of discernment, it is a good idea to practice discernment! An example for me is anything by Edred Thorsson. I will not buy anything from him, but what I have of his on my shelf I keep. Some folks will look at that as an endorsement of his work, whereas I treat it as knowing my enemy. Thorsson has had his work out there for a long time. Often, he is the only modern Heathen Rune author on library or bookstore shelves. So, knowing what he writes and how it affects how people see things helps me communicate with others.
Another direction of discernment is those we trust, whether as Elders, leaders, or as sources of information.
How do you determine who is an expert? How? Why? Are there sources that are red flags? Yellow? Green? Why?
What are some red flags I look for when reading a Heathen author?
Insistence on racial purity or coming from certain European ethnic groups in order to be Heathen.
Insistence that Heathenry is apolitical.
Insistence that there is one way to practice Heathenry or Heathen magic vs there being a multiplicity of ways.
A lack of resources for quotes and references.
Strict gender polarity in worship of Gods or practice of magic.
What are some yellow flags I look for when reading a Heathen author?
The use of non-Heathen cultural terms such as shaman to describe Heathen spiritual practices and pathways instead of culturally relevant ones like seiðkona, seiðmann, or seiðmaðr.
Not clearly labeling their personal experiences as such.
Lack of context for a practice. Telling someone to go útiseta without describing how to do it, for instance.
What are some green flags I look for when reading a Heathen author?
All Heathens regardless of background being welcome.
Context for spiritual terms and practices are clearly established.
Personal experiences are clearly labeled.
Quotes and use of sources are easy to see and follow up on.
Discernment and Decisions
Discernment does not mean doubt. Discernment does not mean we are so enthralled in skepticism that we cannot have spiritual experiences or come to decisions. Discernment is a skill, a tool in our toolkit. As we engage in discernment on communal, interpersonal, and personal bases, we will be better able to come to informed and carefully considered choices. As we engage more in discernment we will be able to evaluate and troubleshoot our experiences effectively. Discernment and the decisions that we make following from it are how we build the next generation of Heathens.
By effectively communicating, teaching, training, and transmitting lessons and lived experiences, we help our communities to thrive. Without discernment well in hand this process becomes clogged. Effective discernment sifts through garbage data, outdated memes, conflicts of personality, and general bullshit. Effective discernment distills useful knowledge and allows communities to share it. The relationships we form with Ginnreginn deepen through its use. Better skill in discernment allows us to better sift vættir and background spiritual noise, making us more effective esotericists and spiritworkers.
We have more distractions and sensationalist articles clamoring for our attention spans from digital and print forms alike. Discernment is a practice that makes us slow down, consider the sources before us, and to soberly evaluate them. When we take this time to evaluate, we can make better decisions. So, my word for this year is Discernment. I hope more folks engage with it!