Mabon, Shining God, Bright One, the blesséd special child who is born in strange circumstances. He becomes New Persons over time. He is a Seeker, the Young Seeker who strives to know and to do. But he’s not just the Youth or Child. In a sense, Mabon also becomes Taliesin and arguably other, mature, mystic Seeker figures. Or, Mabon is representative of this type.
—don’t think you’re a “bad” Mabon because of where you are in life. Mabon is the Doctor, or any vision of him, and he is myself and Angus mac Og and more.
How do you find some lost part of yourself you’ve sent away? Does that part of you go a bit feral? How do you call it back? It lurks out at the edge of your world, drawn like Grendel to where it was cast out, but it watches, probably resentful, maybe a bit amnesiac—
That confident, even arrogant, sure, rebellious persona, sense of self—that me that ________ wanted and saw—e’s been MIA for a while, chucked somewhere in grad school—
So it goes.
K. is a wise dragon, but wise in a not ponderous way (no dragon is Polonius). He has offered to go out to seek me, my doppelganger, out, but I’m not sure that’s a good idea. But as a familiar, well, he’s meant to venture.
Ravens and runes, Authun.
[symbol] [fehu] [ansuz][uruz][thorn][uruz][naudiz]
K. and others tell me to slow my mind and not to draw out moments into hells. I invent my own hells, and I don’t want to.
I had a flash of wisdom, a vision, a WTAW, a metaphor for Mabon—the experience of pre-Taliesin (Gwyon Bach) as a seed amongst seeds, pursued and clucked after by Keredwyn as the hen. Seeds—big old wheat seeds—jumping/falling through the air. There’s something arresting about the image—birth, the precursor to the birth, the containment of Gwyon Bach in the seed as pre-Taliesin, the necessity of it all to become Taliesin—even Keredwyn’s hunger, motherhood, consumption—and self as seed as something to hide and grow and spread. There’s more to this, something to explore—the experience of rebirth, of—well—germinating on a spiritual, mental, even social level. There’s a sense—a self-fulfilling quality to the experience—GB transforms into the seed, rebels and uses the cauldron, flees and sires himself through Keredwyn who pursues and so forth. His old life sucks, has no potentiality other than what he takes/steals/seizes against the authority that enslaved him to stir her cauldron so her ugly, stupid son could get the potentiality that GB claims instead. Mabon is the humanist dream, and there’s a subversive quality to the Taliesin tale, at least (which is the vision I had—and I’ve always felt drawn to the figure of Taliesin).
Mabon, Taliesin, Merlin, Angus—Elric—they are all the product of illicit unions of some kind. In a way, Mabon are all bastards in some way, born in unique/distinct circumstances who rise through education, talent, and other means. In that way, they’re all subversive figures who sidestep/undercut/wit through traditional patriarchal, patrimonial authority.
Cf. to Xian wheat and chaff exegetical trope.
* * *
I called and became a friend to the friend of Wealth, Authun, one of Odin’s kennings. Have wealth—& share it. Be a friend. That’s the “secret.” Don’t be a dick with your wealth.
* * *
I have managed magics lately—mostly by trying and letting them take their course. The living magic of chaos magic has seemed effective—helping secure oddness at work (also thanks to K.), love (though only chimerical and incidental), and through Authun good news on the job front—though the degree and friends help a lot. But it’s been a pleasant surprise to see magic happen. Invoke often, as they say. I think I try to pack too many things into my individual works, though.
I need to prep my new wand.
I also need to hone my workings. Some additional form may help.
But I think Mabon is the right god/Pure One for me. It’s curious (but cool) how the ________ stuff connects. The God is—well—my conduit. We are the Light that shines through me and into this world. ____ feels the call of Ariel—and I have stumbling, waddling, and trundling toward Mabon even as I have feared, avoided, ran from realization. Was it fear of the “Other”—fear of banal/mundane ego loss (the loss of “____” even as ________ grew compartmentalized into safe escapes)—social anxiety of some kind—or something else? Probably all of these things. I should dedicate, initiate myself to Mabon.
—to myself, in that sense—but it’s also acceptance, embrace, recognition, and more.
Thank Dana the seasons turn into spring at last.
But I should remember that dedication initiation is never ultimate, and repetition and difference matter.
That also means being able to accept my notions of self and ______ and self-as-_____ cannot remain static without them becoming daemons, objet petit a, and similar monsters.
As I’ve been reminded of late, movement is life, and stillness is death. (But you should act from stillness and wholeness, resisting paralysis.) I allowed myself to know/see/perform a limited, iconic notion of self that, because I could not “fully” “embrace” or “enact” devolved into an elfy mask of bullshit.
But that’s not how gods or selves should be. And a god denied becomes a demon.
It has been a year or so since I started magic again, partly in response to school stress. As a way to survive the delay and graduation. I have found my familiar. My God and Goddess. Found my closer to myself and so forth. I have had fits and starts and slack periods. And the future builds and progresses.
I suppose that’s another lesson it has taken me a bit too long to learn. The future, what we want, that takes time and fashioning and steps. But it moves forward. And you improve and make progress.
Mabon, Bright Son, Golden Son, Lord of Songs, Shining God—I change, and I embrace my potentiality and Chaos.