2021 Year-End Review and Community Drama

So this may sound like a weird New Year’s Eve/reflection on the year post at first, but here we go anyways. Obviously the past two years have thrown a wrench in many things, including things like being able to have events with other people. Or at least, assuming that you, like me, are prioritizing safety and trying to not create a superspreader event.

Given that 2019 my focus was on bringing in an income and vending at geeky events vs. Pagan events, and that most Pagan events have been canceled or online only during the pandemic, it’s been a really long time since I’ve had the opportunity to do ritual with other people, or be involved in in-person Pagan conferences and festivals.

Overall, this has meant that I have not been involved with very much in the way of Pagan community conflicts. Since the pandemic began, I am getting almost zero messages from people dealing with abusive group leaders or other related Pagan community issues.

In the before-times, there was almost always someone messaging me because they were struggling with some ethical issue or group dynamics or a Pagan leader doing awful things.

While, on the one hand, I’ve been sitting here a lot missing the Pagan conferences and teaching, doing ritual together, and having the chance to connect with folks…I also have found myself grateful for the downtick in the kinds of issues that people generally come to me for help with. It’s not to say those things haven’t happened, it’s just noticeably less.

The major exception to any of this was earlier this year when I spoke up (again) about a certain abusive shop owner who has targeted myself and several other people. I spoke out about his event, and in doing so, I was targeted by him and his allies, and eventually my partner and I were both doxxed.

This all came to mind earlier today when I read a FB post and some comments, and I realized (based on the context/tagging in the comments) that a local-to-me Pagan had blocked me. She isn’t someone I really knew, but she was someone who was very angry with me when I spoke up about an issue in a local group.

I posted about it on FB when it happened; basically, there was a man who regularly attended this group who had a history of sexually harassing women, and some women had finally tried to speak up about it and then Problems Ensued. I backed the folks speaking up, and I became the villain in the scenario. The group imploded, and as best I can tell, some of the folks that were trying to sweep the harassment under the rug seem to blame me, at least in part, for what happened to the group.

Was I a catalyst? Yes. Did I cause the ethical failure that led to this whole situation needing to be outed? Nope.

I also just found out that an acquaintance died; I didn’t know her well, but we both were in the unfortunate club of being victims of my abusive ex. This was the ex that I used to teach Pagan classes with and run community events with in Chicago. He used his position as a teacher and leader to get new partners, and had a habit of lying to prospective partners and indicating that he and I (or whomever he was with) were poly.

I always have felt somewhat protective about the women he duped in part because I helped build his name and reputation. At least, before I spoke out about him once I figured out what was happening. Even though I barely knew her, I definitely grieve every time I hear about something bad happening to the women that he tricked, lied to, and harmed.

Being reminded of the whole thing also reminded me that there are probably a hundred people on my FB friends list that still have him friended. That there are still people out there that don’t consider his actions against me and others to be a reason to cut someone out of their lives.

Why is this a new year’s post?

Because I have realized that I have so much less patience for all of that kind of BS. That, after 15 years of trying to teach leadership skills, I still see the same abusive stuff happening and people still bending over backwards to sweep it under the rug.

That, after years of writing and thousands of words, I’m writing about the same crap. It’s a big part of why I haven’t blogged in so long; I feel like, what’s the point? People are going to continue to do this stuff.

Those of us that call these things out and speak up about it are attacked because we said something about Your Favorite Author or that group leader you really like and trust and they’re so charismatic and fun to be around.

I see you. I see those of you that continue to support problematic authors. I see the publishers that continue to do business with problematic people. I see the events that refuse to create (much less enforce) any kind of safety policy or foster a more consent-focused culture. I see all the folks that just want to have fun and don’t want to hear anything negative about the abuser they are friends with, and then they lash out at those of us who speak up because we are “spoling the fun.”

Those of you that actively or even just passively support the abusers are the reason that so many survivors leave the Pagan community.

Being attacked for speaking up is traumatizing. The trauma I have experienced from speaking up is absolutely a factor in the mental health issues I currently face, as well as the resulting chronic health issues. (Recent studies are absolutely showing that trauma can cause autoimmune and other health issues.)At the year’s end, I’m finding myself in this mental place of, desperately missing teaching and connecting and all the conversations that happen in between the workshops at a conference, and gods, missing chanting and singing together in ritual…

…and at the same time, wondering how do I continue to engage in a community that is so committed to protecting abusers?

I don’t have answers. Will I still try to organize rituals and do more teaching once the pandemic eases up enough that it’s safer? Yes. Because, I miss my community. But, I also have to figure out what appropriate boundaries look like. I don’t want to do events with people who casually support abusers and bigots.

I’m not the first person to write about these issues, nor will I be the last. I know how many of us there are that have struggled with this, because you’ve messaged me to tell me how isolating it is to be without community when everyone closed ranks to protect the abuser you spoke out about it. It is–and I have to stress this–devastatingly more common than many of you might think it is.

I know that I can’t keep putting myself through the psychological wringer of dealing with these kinds of attacks whenever I speak up about an important issue. But, nor do I wish to cede the field to the bullies, abusers, and bigots.

Right now, all I can hope is that 2022 is a better year than 2021 was, and that after this next surge it becomes much safer to gather together…and that some time after that, it becomes possible to do ecstatic rituals with lots of singing and without masks. It breaks my heart how much I miss that sound of all our voices harmonizing together.

Samhain Ritual in Madison WI

I’m excited to start offering workshops and rituals in the Madison, Wisconsin area. Soon I’ll be listing the events I’m hosting on my main website, but I thought I’d put this one here so I have a link I can give people other than a Facebook event.

Return to the Root: Samhain Ritual and Workshops

Do you seek community and spiritual connection?
Do you yearn to claim your magic?
Do the ancient mysteries call to you?

3:30 PM: Doors Open
4 PM: Workshop – Community Building, Leadership, Safety, and Consent
5 PM: Workshop – Temple of Sacred Sound: Chanting and Trancing Techniques
6:00 PM – Break
6:30 PM: Workshop – Samhain Traditions: Honoring the Harvest, our Ancestors, and the Beloved Dead
7:00 PM: Samhain Ritual: Return to the Root
7:10 Doors will close. Don’t be late!
Post-ritual: Folks are welcome to hang out and chat.

From light into darkness, the year has turned. This is year’s final harvest, the time when we seek community and draw together around the fire. It is when we seek the mysteries, when we journey down the roots of the World Tree into the depths to the Underworld, the land of ancestors, of dreaming and shadow. It is the center of the spiral path of initiation where we claim our magic.

All spiritual seekers are welcome. No bigotry or harassment will be tolerated. (A link to a formal safety/inclusivity policy will be posted soon.)

Location:
Dance Life Studio and Fitness, 6725 Seybold Rd, Madison, Wisconsin 53719

4pm – Community Building, Leadership, Safety, and Consent

How do you build a healthy community? This experiential workshop will offer magical and mundane tools to help build sustainable groups. Whether you define yourself as a leader, or you would just like some skills to better support a group, this workshop will address common challenges of small groups including drama, conflict, and issues of harassment and bigotry. We’ll explore tools and processes working with power and structure in groups, boundaries, communication, conflict resolution, safety/anti-harassment policies, group dynamics, as well as exploring what gifts we bring to our communities, and what challenges we face as leaders, organizers, and volunteers.

5pm — Temple of Sacred Sound: Chanting and Trancing Techniques

Chanting is an ancient form of spiritual, meditative, group, and personal practice. Join us to learn chants and work with the interplay of voices, harmonies, rhythm, and movement. We’ll explore different types of chants—chants for holding space, healing, trancework, journeying, and raising energy. We’ll also look at how rhythm and other instruments can add to the power of group chants. The first part of the workshop will be teaching and practicing techniques, and the second part will be a small ritual for healing or journeying. Together we will experience how the ecstatic energy of sound, rhythm, and movement can add depth to ritual or your own personal work. Will you bring your voice to the sacred singing bowl of community? *All skill levels welcome. Feel free to bring drums, shakers, didgeridoos, singing bowls, gongs, or other instruments you’re familiar with.

6pm – Break
This will NOT be a potluck event, but you’re welcome to bring a snack, sandwich, or other simple fare to eat during the break.

6:30 pm — Samhain Traditions: Honoring the Harvest, our Ancestors, and the Beloved Dead

This workshop will offer a chance to discuss various traditions for the dark time of year, and we’ll address the themes of the Return to the Root ritual. Samhain mean’s Summer’s End in Gaelic; it’s the end of the harvest season and the last preparation before winter. This seasonal celebration honors death as part of the cycle of life. It’s when we honor our ancestors and beloved dead. The nights grow longer and there is more space for silence, for inner reflection, for releasing and letting go and to acknowledge what we personally harvest this year. To honor the sacred life cycle of our bodies and the land we live on, we must also understand the depths of the Underworld, of death, of transformation.

7:00 PM: Samhain Ritual: Return to the Root

In this ritual, we will journey down the roots of the World Tree that bridges the realms…through the gates of the Underworld, down to the center, to the deep within. We seek the Well of Need, the sacred life-giving waters held in the depths of the earth. In these uncertain times, we seek our magic, we seek the song of our spirit, we seek the waters of the well. What calls you forth? Why would you risk the journey of transformation? What do you yearn for, and what do you fear? What challengers bar your way? What wisdom do your ancestors have for you? What beloved dead will you honor?

We seekers must each make this passage, we must each face our shadows and find the mirror in the center of our heart. Will you claim the power hidden in the shattered glass of your sacred heart? How do you make beauty from the broken? To claim your magic, to heal, to drink from the sacred well, we must release what no longer serves and let our old stories die.

Will you wake the song in your blood? Together we gather in the alchemy of ecstatic and participatory community ritual to dip our hands down into the waters of life…to sing and drum the call of our souls.

Admission:
Sliding scale is $5-$25, no one turned away. We’d rather have your voice and your presence whether or not you can afford to pay. Donations go to cover the space rental fee and supply costs.

Location: Dance Life Studio and Fitness, 6725 Seybold Rd, Madison, Wisconsin 53719

Children:
This event is not appropriate for children. Well-behaved and responsible teens are welcome to attend the workshops and ritual. Adult themes may be addressed, and workshops/rituals may require silence and stillness.

Facilitator: Shauna Aura Knight
Shauna is an author and artist living in Madison, WI. She writes books and teaches workshops on leadership, community building, consent, and facilitation skills in the Earth-Centered community. Find out more about her at www.shaunaauraknight.com or contact her via Facebook, at ShaunaAura@gmail.com, or via text message at 773-812-2917 with any questions or to find out how to become more involved in rituals and events like this.

Will you step into your deepest self?
Will you be the hero of your own journey?

Book Release: Path of a Seeker

I have had this book sitting there almost finished for about two years now, so it’s a huge relief to have it out the door and to the printers! Like some of my other works, this book is a collection of articles and essays that I’ve written, though in this case, the focus is on personal spiritual seeking and my own path of pilgrimage.

While there are still good tips in the book for leaders, and I think that the shadow work I’ve engaged in as a seeker and a leader might be of use to leaders, the intended audience isn’t just people leading  groups. It’s for anyone trying to find their way on what is often a confusing and daunting path.

Also,  this book focuses on my experiences as a modern Pagan; however, I believe that anyone that has explored holistic health and personal growth, has an interest in new age and metaphysical topics, or defines themselves as spiritual but not religious, will find a connection to these experiences.

Here’s a little more about the book, and some links to where you can get it. If you order books directly from me, I’ll be able to ship them in about two weeks.

Path of a Seeker: Pilgrimages, Passages, and Personal Transformations

The path of spiritual seeking is a spiral, a pulsation back and forth of challenges unique to each of us. Through our own experiences, we learn and find our way. The quest for inner growth means we must understand ourselves at a deeper level; we must change our old stories, release what does not serve us, and find our own deep inner wisdom to heal ourselves. What do you seek?

This book is a collection of articles and essays focusing on personal transformation in a way that is accessible and real, not perfectionist. You will find spiritual experiences that are shattering moments of bliss, dark nights of the soul, challenges with mental health, struggling with trauma and grief…and stories of love, of facing our shadows, of growing healthy boundaries and self-confidence, of reclaiming our power. The journey brings us from heartbreak into joy, love, and authenticity.

Why do you seek the inner mysteries?  What do you yearn for?

You can buy the book here:

Kindle Ebook on Amazon $9.99

Paperback (directly from the author) $20

Becoming Comfortable in Open Relationships

I’ve been in open relationships of various formats for many years. For a long time I struggled with the label “polyamorous,” but I’ve come to accept it for myself, along with becoming comfortable with how polyamory and monogamy are a spectrum, not absolutes.

This is the essence of what polyamory means for me personally: I have to be able to be not just ok with my partner being with someone else, but genuinely glad for them. I have to be genuinely excited that my partner is happy, and in most cases, happy for the person/people they are spending time with too.

It’s being fully confident that my partner can love me, and other people. And that I can have feelings for more than one person, and those feelings don’t take away from anyone.

What’s Toxic?

Being polyamorous doesn’t mean I can’t also experience jealousy–some jealousy is normal. Or frustration when plans are complicated because I have more than two humans to schedule around. It’s that there’s something in there transcending the jealousy. Sure, there are times when I might want my partner’s attention and he’s with someone else. Or, scheduling dates is a twisted pile of spaghetti because we have multiple partners to schedule with. But ultimately for me, feeling comfortable with polyamory is me not worrying that my partner’s going to just find someone else and abandon me. Or, vice versa; that I’m not just dating one partner while looking for someone else I like better.

What I think is most important for me isn’t so much whether I’m dating multiple people, but that I’m actively working against the toxic aspects of monogamy. I’m not one of those poly folks that thinks everyone should be poly and pressures people into it. In fact–that’s part of why I rejected the label in the first place.

I do, however, believe that monogamy has some toxic aspects that don’t serve anyone, and it’s worth examining relationship assumptions for relationships in any format. But I’ll get into that.

A few years ago I wrote a blog series on my own explorations in various different types of open relationships, i.e., ethically non-monogamous relationships. At the time, I was in an open relationship but hadn’t yet had the experience of being in love with more than one person at the same time.

In fact, it has been a little odd to realize that I’d never really been in love with any of my previous partners. I loved some of them, but I wasn’t in love, and there’s definitely a difference.

Why Avoid the Label?

Through good relationships, and bad, I learned a lot. The first reason I avoided the label “polyamorous”  was that, though I’d dated multiple men, I wasn’t in love with any of them. Friends, sure. Loving, sure. But I wasn’t “in love,” and I guess I didn’t feel like I fully qualified. The other reason was that there’s this really unfortunate thing where some of the most visibly polyamorous people in any given community are also the folks most likely to be sexually harassing, coercing, and lying to people to get sex. 

Now–we can say, “That’s not really polyamory,” all we want. It’s about as effective as saying that the abusive leaders in Paganism aren’t “really” Pagan. The point is that, at least in the Pagan community, the first exposure many people have to polyamory is the poly-pressuring person. The person sexually harassing others, or the person who isn’t poly at all but is cheating on their partner.

I’ve been cheated on by men who did that, and I’ve had men tell me they were poly and cheat on their partners with me. I also know of so many stories of people at Pagan gatherings, or in other groups, dealing with the unethical/creepy poly person. There are a few times when I’ve thrown up my hands and said, “Why is it always the abusive poly guy running the local polyamory meetup?”

However, I’ve also met a ton of really ethical poly folks, people with beautiful relationships, people working to learn better communication skills and how to be better partners and better humans.

Every subculture deals with people engaging in abuse, manipulation, and harassment. It’s not an intrinsic flaw with non-monogamous relationships.

But Feelings

When I wrote that blog series on open relationships, I hadn’t yet fallen for my partner G. We eventually acknowledged we had feelings for one another. I had to admit to myself that this was the first time I’d been in love with someone. Or at least, where that love was reciprocated.

I’ve had feelings of deep friendship and connection to past partners. But there was a visceral difference between “I love you and care for you” and “I’m in love with you.”

A year into the relationship with G, I developed feelings for someone else. He wasn’t in a fully open relationship, so we didn’t do anything about our mutual attraction, but I was able to experience feeling love for two separate people. And the love for the one didn’t take away the love for the other in any way. Love for the one didn’t make me want to abandon the other. It’s something that is hard to put into words, but I understood it fully once I experienced it.

It was also a unique experience to feel attraction to someone and be completely comfortable not doing anything about it. Something else that polyamory makes space for in a way that toxic monogamy doesn’t is the reality that we can love many people, and that those relationships are not required to be sexual (or romantic) to be valid.

Juggling Multiple Partners

One of my constant fears in relationships used to be letting my partner down. I’m busy, I get sucked into creative projects, I travel a lot. For my monogamous relationships in my 20’s and 30’s, I know my partners felt neglected. How much of that was them emotionally abusing me is a separate and more complex issue.

My response to this in my late 30’s was focusing on relationships with non-monogamous men with other partners; they were busy too. I wasn’t worried that they would be angry at me for not being constantly available. So I was dating men in open relationships, but I myself wasn’t dating multiple people. I was pretty comfortable with my partner seeing other people even if I wasn’t, because I didn’t have time anyways.

I still have mixed success with juggling multiple partners of my own. It seems to go the best when everyone else is also really busy.

When Poly Goes Badly

Fastforwarding through a lot of conflict, the relationship with G ended poorly. I had moved in with him and his wife. His wife made a show of welcoming me to the home, but ultimately that was a manipulative set up and she ended up being incredibly emotionally abusive. I finally was able to get the money together to move out of their house toward the end of 2017. (I’ll be writing more about abuse in poly relationships in the future.)

As I began trying to heal from the resulting trauma, I wondered, “How can I possibly try polyamory again? How could I ever trust a metamor (partner’s partner) after this kind of trauma?” Right after that, I even tried dating a guy casually, and it turned out that he had represented himself as not monogamous, but his other partner didn’t see it that way.

I wrestled with the trauma, with my fears about any relationships. Fears of discovering my partner’s abusive, or neglectful and unwilling to engage in emotional labor, or that just abandons me. Or that my metamor is abusive.

What Makes It Work

This is pretty obvious, but what makes relationships work whether monogamous or polyamorous is a good partner. Relationships are far less work when your partner is not manipulative, neglectful, abusive, or an asshole.

I met someone a year ago who has been an amazing partner. His code-name is Fantasy Author Boyfriend. We’re well suited to each other; we’re both writers, we’re both busy people. We love spending time together, but we also love having our own space. If I’ve got my head buried in a project (like this week I’m editing a book) he doesn’t worry that I don’t love him because I’m not available to hang out. And vice versa; I know that he’s busy and him not responding to a text doesn’t mean he’s leaving me.

Now–some of that is trust we had to build. Anxiety and C-PTSD are what they are, and I have my moments where I’m worried he’ll abandon me too. However, he also deals with anxiety, and he’s willing to engage in emotional labor with me. We fell in love with one another, but that was followed up with both of us caring for each other and putting the work in to communicate, be supportive, and respect each other’s boundaries.

It feels completely different from someone who is trying to manipulate me into thinking that I’m the one with the problem.

All of that is stuff I’d have to deal with in a monogamous relationship, too. It extends into polyamory, though–because of that work, I feel genuinely safe with my partner dating someone else. Because we do the work of communicating with one another openly and honestly, he knows I love him, I know he loves me, and we’re in a far better place to date other people without neglecting one another.

In other words–now that I’m in a relationship with a human being who isn’t manipulative, abusive, or otherwise a bad partner, trust is a heck of a lot easier. It’s easier for me to be happy when he says he has been chatting with someone online and they seem to have hit it off. He’s excited for me when I am going on a first date. Sometimes he helps me figure out a place to go out. Sometimes I help him flirt.

What is more important to either of us than who else we are dating is how we treat each other and the people we care about. We’ve both worked hard to make clear commitments to one another while avoiding the toxic aspects of monogamy.

Toxic Monogamy

I don’t have issues with monogamy, I have issues with the unfortunate cultural assumptions that go with it. This idea that once you commit to someone they own you, your time, and your affection. That feels so manipulative to me now. I also reject the idea that I’m supposed to be jealous because my partner is spending time with someone he cares about.

Given I’ve been cheated on (and used by cheaters), I have plenty of reason to inherently distrust men I’m partnered with. That being said, there are particular behaviors that also accompany cheating. There’s almost always a level of manipulation or abuse going on, so it’s never a standalone thing where cheating is the only problem in the relationship.

My partner and I don’t try to be everything to one another because that’s impossible. I no longer feel guilty when my partner wants to do something I’m not into, or if our schedules don’t line up. If he wants to go sing show tunes at karaoke, he has people he can do that with, platonic or romantic. It’s not a judgment against me

For me, so much of this is just about being comfortable. That the relationship is stable whether we’re dating other people or not. 

Metamors and Schedules

What has also transformed my experience of polyamory is that I started dating someone new. I’m still busy, but fortunately the pressure’s pretty low. We’re all pretty busy and there’s no huge blame or judgment when one or the other of us is busy. Also, his wife is awesome. And some of their other partners and friends are awesome. There isn’t a trace of the coercive abusive ick that I experienced with G’s wife.

Heck, sometimes I chat more with her than I do with the new guy I’m dating! I’m looking forward to becoming stronger friends with her as we get to know one another better.

Transparency, Communication, and Assumptions

One aspect of any relationship that is highly toxic is assumptions. The expectations aren’t communicated, it’s just assumed that this is how it’s “supposed” to go…and then your partner doesn’t follow the script, and you get pissed off. Or we bottle it up in a passive/aggressive dynamic til it explodes.

In polyamory, you really do have to talk about everything–or at least, if you take things for granted, the relationships unravel more quickly than monogamous ones because there are more humans involved.

I have found that being able to comfortably speak to my partner(s) transparently, and having them reciprocate this, is the core of what makes my relationship(s) work well. It can be a little awkward at first, but it has helped a lot to not make assumptions for each other, to respect each other’s boundaries. And the communication gets easier the more we are comfortable with one another.

My partner and I don’t assume that each other is obliged to attend family events, or assume how often we’re going to see each other, who pays for dinner, or a host of other things. We talk about what actually bothers us, we talk about what we need from one another.

Another interesting facet of polyamory for me is how much less attached I am to whether or not a relationship is sexual/romantic. Maybe a relationship starts out that way, then transitions to friendship. Or goes the other way. Or, the romantic aspect goes dormantht, and then years later rekindles.

Being poly means I don’t have to pretend that my partner’s never going to be attracted to someone else ever again (because, that’s unrealistic). It means that I’m not pressured to cut off contact with a former lover because my partner’s worried they’re somehow a threat.

As I said at the beginning: polyamory, for me, is being glad that my partner’s spending time with someone he loves. And knowing he’s glad for me when I am. And, relationships of any type are going to work better if they aren’t full of toxic, manipulative garbage. I’m glad to have found some equilibrium, and to have found good partners.

Monogamous or polyamorous, you can’t make someone respect your boundaries, care enough to do emotional labor, or making assumptions. You can’t make someone want to communicate transparently and genuinely. Finding that has been a small miracle in my life, and I do not take it for granted for a minute.

C-PTSD: It Can Get Better

I’ve been reading drafts of old blog posts. Things I started, and never finished over the past couple of years while I was dealing with some fairly intensive trauma. It’s good to see those snippets into the past, because I realize that–even though I still have bad days–it can get better.

Here’s something I wrote about two years ago:

“Some days, my heart is full of sorrow; other days, just heavy and numb. Today, like many days, I wake up and have trouble getting out of bed. It’s not the joint aches, it’s the fear of all the things yet to be done and the terror that my motivation has disappeared again. It’s wondering why I fight so hard. Some days, I have trouble finding any motivation at all, like it disappeared down a bottomless sacred well, always just beyond my reach. I want love to matter. I want love to be the force that changes us, the force that can change the world for the better. But, love isn’t always enough.“

People Will Tell You Who They Are

The older I get, the more I realize that people will show me who they are if I let them. I’ve just had someone who I thought was becoming a close friend dump me via FB message and then block me, and all because his now girlfriend found out about how he lied to her about me. Here’s the context…and before I dive into that, an acknowledgement that I haven’t blogged here in a while. The open relationship I was in and (had posted about) crumbled because of the abuse of my metamour, and my now former partner’s enabling of that abuse not just of himself but of his kids and of me. In the wake of dealing with that heartbreak, I met someone new, and got my heart broken again when I wasn’t ready for it.

For transparency, I’m not naming this person; I do publicly name people who are egregiously abusive. I don’t feel this falls into that category. FWIW, I do wish his girlfriend well and I’m sorry that this hurt her. And if she ever contacts me for fact checking/confirmation, I’m certainly willing to talk to her.

Back to the current situation. So…back in late October I met a guy on an online dating site. He and I really clicked, but we recognized that there were some logistical issues, one being that he smoked, and I have scent/smoke issues. Another was that he was also seeing someone else and was very hopeful for that relationship, but that relationship was not steady/monogamous as of yet. And he and I chatted more and there was chemistry, so we attempted a compromise date in early November. I took an excedrin, he promised to shower as much smoky smell off himself as he could, and he bought an e-cig to use for the day before we went on a date.

Leadership Issues: Failure to Plan

This post is both about venting my spleen about issues in my household, and a lesson in Pagan leadership, particularly event organizers. I live on a farm in a rural area, and the top of the silo half blew off in the storm last week and is now bouncing around precariously. Some parts have fallen, the rest needs to come down. I live with my boyfriend and his wife, and it turns out that my boyfriend’s wife (ie, my metamour) is highly emotionally abusive. It’s a complicated situation and the abuse impacts the rest of the scenario.

Getting back to the silo, my partner had a plan for doing this on Tuesday on his day off. (He works third shift on a rotating schedule of 12-hour shifts. This weekend he works Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night, so he’s pretty wiped out by the end of that.) We talked through how I could help with the plan, and waiting til Tuesday gives me time to finish up some of my own backlogged to-do list.

My metamour, however, decided to just do it today on her own. This didn’t go well. But first, the backstory.

My boyfriend planned to borrow a friend’s truck with the appropriate towing capacity (his car can tow a lot, but not a full lift), rent a lift, and use his saw to cut through the straps holding the aluminum sails to the top of the silo. Since my partner works with tools and metal professionally, I was reasonably confident that he knows what will work. to remove the top of the silo.

We also talked through a backup plan so that, if needed, we could move my storage box from beneath the silo. this is the box part of a truck and I use it to store art supplies and ritual decor.

My boyfriend’s relatives rent his land and farm it, and they have a vehicle that could move the truck box. However, that would require me to unload a fair amount of the items because it’s a lot of fragile glass stuff. But, doable in about an hour, if it’s both of us and if we have my cart assembled, and maybe his car on hand to hold some of the stuff while the storage box gets moved.

I’m not going to be really useful on the tools and cutting end, but I offered to help spot him. My boyfriend is really bad with heights; I’m not totally comfortable but I literally took a job hanging lights in a concert hall to be able to cope better with heights, so I’m used to dangling on lifts.

Ok, so we have plan, and backup plan. Except, nope.

The metamour borrows the friend’s truck yesterday, and today goes and rents the lift and hauls that over. She gets it set up at the foot of the silo. It’s a very windy day, and to be honest, if we had that kind of wind, I’d have opted to cancel and reschedule the lift rental. But she goes forward, except, she has not planned to have anybody go up in the lift with her to spot her, or anyone on hand to help if there is an accident, except the 11-year old highly-distractable boychild. My boyfriend’s not available because hes’ in the middle of his 3-day work cycle and he sleeps during the day. I sleep during the day too, but I wouldn’t be available to help her anyways because I cut off all contact with my metamour when her emotional abuse became apparent. Again, part of a longer story, but the context is important.

Apparently, she couldn’t get the lift close enough to the silo to cut the top off, so she decides she’ll just move my storage box on her own without asking me or talking to my partner. She contacts the relatives with the vehicle that can move it. Fortunately, my boyfriend has woken up for work by this point and tells her no, she can’t just move it, it has to be emptied.

She insists that he told her it was empty, and he says “No, I said it didn’t have anything really heavy in it, but it’s full of fragile stuff.” So she cancels the relatives coming over to move the storage box.

What that leaves us with is several hundred dollars spent to rent the lift, and nothing to show for it.

Pagan Leadership, Planning, and Control Freaks

Here’s how this is a lesson for Pagan leadership, especially event organizers. So many organizers really fail to plan. Add to that the tendency to be micromanagers/perfectionists/control freaks, and you have a real problem.

My metamour, for instance, is absolutely certain that nobody can wash the dishes as well as she can. It’s also impossible to use her “system” to do the laundry and succeed at it, you’re guaranteed to fail. She is also convinced that some of the household carpentry was done wrong because she wasn’t the one to do it herself.

And sure, she knows more about carpentry than I do, and she’s far more of a neat freak than I am, so maybe she’s more attentive. That being said, I assisted her on a building project to build a cabinet to house her massage table and other related items, and the cabinet ended up being fairly crooked. It wasn’t so crooked that it couldn’t be used for its intended purpose, but it definitely wasn’t square. I was just helping hold boards and taking direction.

Feedback or Abuse?

Historically, my metamour gets upset when my boyfriend points out places where her lack of planning, or her control freak tendencies, have produced results that have actually been harmful to the household. She says he’s being abusive and attacking her. Having been witness to a few of her failures to plan, to her control freak behavior, and to their conversations, I realize how much of a similarity there is to problems I’ve witnessed in Pagan groups.

A lot of leaders feel attacked by feedback. And it’s true that being a leader means you have a target painted on your back. You’re going to get blamed for all sorts of stuff that isn’t your fault. And yes, I’ve been on the receiving end of feedback that ranges from useless to abusive.

But, when someone offers genuine feedback about an event or something else, you have to be able to listen to that.

I’ve seen a lot of Pagan event organizers especially start planning an event and they just pull the trigger on doing something that has drastic consequences for the rest of the event. That ranges from going forward with an event without having enough volunteers, to promoting an event before the venue was rented, to focusing on designing t-shirts (and buying them) before there’s even a solid plan for the event itself. I’ve seen event organizers make a ton of assumptions about how things will go; failing to plan enough space between vendor tables, failing to create a workable schedule.

I’ve made some rookie mistakes as an event organizer, and I’ve also had the problem many organizers do where I assumed that someone would do the job they said they would, and then they didn’t, and I had to do the job myself, and I did a less-good job of it. That stuff happens. But there’s a real problem when there’s a consistent failure to plan ahead, or when the failure to plan harms others.

And especially, when the person who failed to plan is called out for it with clear feedback and instead of listening to the feedback, they fire/exile the person for it, or they claim they are being attacked, bullied, and abused.

Worse yet is when the person is convinced that there wasn’t a problem in the first place, that they are right and they know exactly what they are doing.

Control Freaks

I know a thing or two about this; I consider myself a recovering control freak, and I’ve written a few articles in more depth about this tendency in leaders.  And here’s the breakdown: Sometimes, it’s worth it to be a control freak and a perfectionist. If you’re running an event where there’s a particular artistic vision you’re holding onto, and there are specific tasks that you really are the best person to do, ok. You get to be a perfectionist there and focus your efforts on getting those things done.

This is a balancing act that I do with a number of my rituals and events. There are specific things that maybe nobody else on the team has the skills to do; maybe nobody else is an artist, or another skillset. In my case, I want the altars and decorations set up a particular way, so I plan to have enough time to do that myself. Helpers can help me unpack the decor, and break it down for packing at the end, and can haul things around and save me a lot of time. But I want it set up a particular way and I know there’s no good way to communicate that to a volunteer, so I just take the time to do it myself. It’s actually one of the ways I center myself to prepare for a ritual.

And, I get enough positive feedback on my ritual decor, and my artwork in general, that I’m reasonably sure my sense of aesthetic has a positive impact on the work.

Often enough, though, a control freak isn’t actually the best person for a particular job. They may have this delusion that nobody can do it better than them, but as it happens, they aren’t actually as good at Task A as someone else. Or, maybe it’s a thing that someone else can do just fine, but they’ll do it in a different way.

Are You Sure You’re Right?

Given her history, I’m pretty sure my metamour decided to cut off the top of the silo with at least one of her motivations being she believes that nobody else was going to do as good of a job with it. I’m also pretty sure that my metamour still thinks she’s good at planning, even though I have two years of evidence to show that she isn’t. Everything from family trips to getting the day passes from 4-H to get the kids into the cat show to construction efforts; she wants to be the person who can do the thing, and her failure to plan has cost the household in time, money, and frustration.

Just a few weeks ago my boyfriend had to flip his schedule from nights to days (flipping schedules is really exhausting, if you haven’t done it) in order to attend a graduation of one of her family members. She got the time wrong by several hours. He slept for all of a couple hours, got up, got dressed, they got the kids packed into the van and began the drive. My metamour called a member of her family to confirm the time, after they began the drive, and found out that the graduation wasn’t til the afternoon. It was a 1-2 hour drive, so they turned around, he tried to take a nap, didn’t really get any sleep, and then got back in the car and tried again. This has a real cost to him and his health, plus I have seen her then turn around and get mad at him for not getting XYZ tasks done when he was dealing with all the extra work from her failure to plan.

Again–mistakes happen, but a consistent failure to be able to plan means that an event organizer really needs to consider if they are the best person for the job.

What if You Aren’t a Great Planner?

Often in Pagan groups, there are only so many people with the “bug” for event planning. There are only so many people with the drive to go and get it done. That being said, if a failure to plan is causing strife on your team, if it’s costing money, if your vendors, performers, speakers, or attendees are having issues that negatively impact them, you may want to take some time to consider what to do.

here are options that divide out roles, for instance. Let’s say you’re the go-getter-git’r’done person who can make the thing happen…but thinking ten steps ahead in chess moves is not so much your thing. What do you do? One potential solution here is that you can work to collaborate with someone who can talk through things with you.

In the Myers Briggs personality test, I (and probably my boyfriend) test out as an INTJ. That means that I have a plan, a contingency plan, and contingency for the contingency plan. I love strategizing and noodling out planning details for projects I’ll never even be part of, because I’m just that kind of nerd.

I can be annoying in the ideation phase of an event because I can see the problems in the details way before most other folks. Like, “Hey, let’s do an event at ____location. We can save money by catering it ourselves.” Me: “I’m pretty sure they require a caterer on their approved list.”

Yeah–that kind of thing can be annoying, but really it’s way better than renting the venue and then getting pissed off that they require a caterer, but you’ve already paid them, and then you have to tell people, “Sorry, there won’t be any food at all at this all-day event, and there are no food sellers within walking distance, and no, you can’t bring your own food onsite.” It’s a small detail that can blow an event.

When it’s Just Toxic

However, there’s really no hope for an event organizer that can’t plan ahead, and who is a control freak and thinks they are right all the time. That kind of disorganization, and micromanaging, is a toxic combination. Usually folks who do both of those also have a number of abusive tendencies, in my experience.

Sometimes the folks who don’t plan well get away with it, at least for a while. They’re charismatic and talk people into helping them out, or they luck out and wiggle their way through. My metamour, for instance, is charismatic and flirtatious. She often gets her way by flirting with people. I have frequently heard her say, “I’ll just show my tits to them and get them to move the furniture,” or some version of that. She delights in manipulating people to do what she wants, particularly through sexual flirtation. That can work for a time. Heck, this kind of abusive personality can even make you feel good about being manipulated if they are really skilled. It’s still toxic as hell.

If you’re noticing any of these behaviors in yourself (failure to plan, or being a control freak) don’t worry–there’s hope. If you can acknowledge you do it, you can usually work through it.

If you’re working with someone who is in total denial about those behaviors, or about any manipulative or abusive behaviors–the only advice I have is, cut ties. That toxic and abusive behavior is unlikely to change.

Pantheacon 2017 Schedule

Here it is, my schedule for this year’s Pantheacon. The bolded items are workshops or rituals I’m leading, or supporting. As always, we’ll see how many of the workshops I actually get to.

I am trying to carve out actual time for dinner this year; the last couple of years I had specific dinner engagements (one each year) and this year I have hopes to leave that time free to grab a meal with people I don’t get to see much. As always, with that much going on, who knows, but this is the theoretical schedule. Only thing I can guarantee is that I’ll be at the workshops and rituals I’m supposed to be at
Friday

• 1:30 pm Nourishing Empowering Leadership (Starhawk)
• 3:30 pm Architecture of Ritual: Engaging Participation
• 5:00 Dinner
• 7:00 pm The Awen I Sing from the Deep, or A Ritual for the Great Turning
• 9:00 pm Cauldron Work: The Cauldron of Poesy
• 11:00 pm Fifty Shades of Greyface

Saturday

• 9:00 am Magickal Drumming – Ritual/Ceremonial Drumming workshop (Don Schulz)
• 11:00 am Ritual Participation Skills (Phaedra Bonewits)
• 1:30 pm Procession of the Fallen Light (Penczak)
• 3:30 pm Chanting and Trancing workshop in the ADF Suite
• (Hexenfest art show/auction)
• 5:00 Dinner
• 7:00 pm Mythpunk Masquerade (til 10)

Sunday

• 10:00 am-12PM PaganBloggers.com in Sisterhood of Avalon suite
• 1:30 pm Nonviolent De-escalation techniques (Rhyd Wildemuth Crystal Blanton)
• 3:30 pm Journey to the Sacred Well: Seeking Our Magic
• 7:00 pm Embracing Restorative Magic (Crystal Blanton)
• 5:00 pm Dinner
• 9:00 pm Dance Elemental/ ADF Ritual for Unity
• 11:00 pm Hekate at the Crossroads: Meeting of Mind and Movement (Laura Tempest Zakroff)

Monday

• 9:00 am Music, Magic, and the Art of Ritual Soundscapes (with Gwion Raven)
• 11:00 am Biochemistry of trance: Optimizing going there and coming back

Workshop descriptions:

Architecture of Ritual: Engaging Participation

How do you raise energy in ritual? Ecstatic ritual creates potent rituals and transformative experiences. But how do you engage participation from people of different ages, different physical mobility, and with different learning modalities? How do you keep people chanting? We’ll explore the design of rituals and how layering trancework and ritual structure and flow can engage participation including chanting, movement, rhythm, as well as deeper participation through emotional connection. Participants will have the opportunity to practice ritual skills. Experienced and new ritualists welcome.

Bardic Music, Ritual Magic: Chanting and Trancing Techniques (ADF Suite)

Ecstatic ritual techniques such as chanting, drumming, and movement, work to engage the trance state. And humans are hard-wired to be inspired by myth, by story. Regardless of your tradition, these techniques can add dimension and potency to your rituals. These are also tools that can be layered. Want to experiment with trance journeys that are sung? Want to try adding harmonies or rhythm to your chanting? Want to learn how to bring the deep magic through story, and through authenticity, to get participants to actually participate? Class will involve hands-on exploration of techniques to engage deeply impactful ritual experiences.

Journey to the Sacred Well: Seeking Our Magic

Remember when we stood together under the starry sky, when we lifted our hands from the sacred well to drink? Join us for an ecstatic, participatory ritual to seek the magic of the ancient waters. If you could call out for the magic…the inspiration…life force and hope…would you dare? What incantation will you sing to wish on the stars? Seeking this magic means journeying down the roots of the world tree…gazing into the mirror of souls…seeking the mysteries of your very depths. What must you transform? And what is the dream in the center of your heart? Adults/mature teens only, closed at 15 min

Music, Magic, and the Art of Ritual Soundscapes (with Gwion Raven)

Can you hear the call, the kaleidoscope of sound and rhythm cascading together to weave our magic? We’ll go beyond chanting and into the rich tapestry of sound as ritual technology including: layered harmonies, vocal percussion, drumming, instruments, crafting extemporaneous chants, trancework, and more. Delve into the mysteries of our collective voices as we craft a sweet song of devotion, a furious incantation…as the beat of drums and stomping feet calls us home. Together we’ll create a musical intention; bring your voices, drums, bodies, and any instruments you like! All skill levels welcome.

Full Moon Gratitude: February

I can’t believe Pantheacon’s in a week. So much to do! It’s full moon again, and I’m once again feeling a lot of gratitude, so I thought I’d post about that. Gods know we could all use a little hope in the world right now.

Your Hate has Made You Powerful

This one’s a repost as the blog it was on is now defunct. Though I wrote it a few years ago, it seemed appropriate given the political climate and the many people rising as activists to fight against a bigoted regime.

There’s a quote from Star Wars: Return of the Jedi that has nagged at me for years. In my 20′s, it was an inspiring quote that brought a lot of energy to me when the chips were down and I was fighting the good fight.

After I did a lot of feminist leadership training, I reversed my opinion on the line: “Your hate has made you powerful.”

Here’s what has itched at me.  Hate is “bad,” right? So why is it some of my greatest creative bursts come when I’ve been enraged enough to see red? I have painted large murals in mere hours when fueled by my wrath…I have felt that hot, dark pulse of creative inspiration in a moment of anger.

But if I am feeling hate, then I’m not a spiritually-developed, balanced person, right?

This was the struggle I went through as I engaged in a multi-year mystery school program of personal and spiritual development. This mystery school also led to my getting training as a leader of spiritual groups and facilitator of rituals. I had always thought of my anger as just one piece of my energy. I had thought that my anger was something that I–as an artist, a creative–had the power to transmute.

Sometimes I even thought of it like the Bene Gesserit women from the novel/movie Dune who transmute the Water of Life from a poison into a water that others can drink and that offers a deep spiritual experience. (Yes, sort of like Siberian Shamans and mushrooms, but that’s another post entirely.) However, the more work that I did in this leadership program, and the more I was exposed to principles of nonviolence, the more I began to fear my own anger. The more I began to do personal work exploring myself and my motivations and my emotions and my boundaries…the more shadows I encountered, the more I tried to work to “fix” myself.

And…I have to liken what happened at that point in my life to this metaphor. I was like a half-trained programmer working with a huge amount of code. I feel like I was trying to hack my life–hack my Self and self-identity–and I deleted too large of a line of code. Of course the rest of the app (in other words, me) didn’t work right after that.

What I mean is, I decided somewhere in there that anger, rage, and hate were inherently “bad” and if I was taking energy from them then that made me “bad” as well. So I basically began the process of cutting off that source of my energy, my power, my motivation.

It was like a tree cutting off half of its taproot system.

Motivation, Anger, and Bullying
I used to have a limitless supply of energy for a project. The bigger the project, the more energy I had for it. And somewhere in the depths of my brain…in my subconscious…in the mire of my old wounds and my pain from my past, the energy that I had often came from hate. Specifically, my hate for my peers who had abused me in middle school. Somewhere inside of me, every time I was doing some big huge project, like running an event, I was saying “Fuck you” to the kids who had bullied and abused me in school.

I just recently read an article about the long-term effects of childhood bullying.  http://www.bilerico.com/2014/04/bullying_causes_decades_of_harm_new_study_shows.php

I certainly suffered from years of poor self esteem, which has a rippling impact on the rest of my life. I’ve written other posts on working with the wounds of our past. Somehow, when I did a big creative project, like when I’d organize one of the Star Wars themed parties at a Sci-fi Convention, I felt like I was giving my classmates the finger. Like I was somehow proving that I was indeed better than them.

That I was beyond all that they had ever done to me.

There were times when my energy for a project was absolutely inexhaustible. There are times when I’ve stayed up for days, fueled by limitless energy. I think I maybe got a little unnerved when I realized how much of my creative energy was being sourced from the deep, bottomless well of “Fuck you.”

Need For Approval
Tied up within that was my own need for approval, largely from mentors. Since from grade school through high school I didn’t really have many friends among my peers, I had always sourced my need for approval from teachers, adults, and other people in authority. Basically, I wasn’t getting friendship or affection, but what I could get was approval for good grades, or approval for being “good.”

And, as you might expect, that became a factor when I began doing the deep personal work at this particular mystery school. I desperately wanted the approval of my mentors.

So when I learned how much anger towards those bullies I had been harboring those years, and when I was exposed to techniques of nonviolent communication, and as I did more personal growth work, I got the idea that sourcing my energy from anger made me “bad.”

Well, I didn’t want to be “bad.” I’d never get approval from my mentors if I was “bad,” right?

It took me rather a few years to unravel what I’d done to myself, and how I’d gone a little overboard in my course correction. I had already been facing a lot of depression symptoms–largely, exhaustion, brain fog, and lack of motivation or interest in things that used to interest me. Those symptoms got worse as the years went on.

Any time I felt a rush of energy from that “fuck you” source, I felt a rush of corresponding guilt, and then exhaustion. Instead of staying mad, I’d get tired. Many times, I’d feel the overwhelming need to sleep, immediately. I started doing less events, and less grandiose events. Less projects, less creative work. And then I’d get sad and tired thinking, I haven’t done any cool projects lately, nothing worth doing.

And that would make me more sad.

It’s really hard to say how much of this depression was from me trying to change too much internal programming, and how much was from what I’d later discover was an intolerance to gluten, dairy, and to other preservatives and chemicals. I can say that when I finally started eating the right foods for me (basically the paleo diet) many of my depression/exhaustion symptoms reduced tremendously.

But what I think also happened in the intervening years of personal growth work is that I regrew my taproots in a healthier way, and I renegotiated my work with my anger.

Boundaries and Self Esteem
Back when I was sourcing my project and creative energy in “Fuck you,” it was pretty simple math. I had terrible self esteem. I had a poor sense of self and self identity. When there are old wounds, old holes in the ego, one of the ways that manifests is through extreme defensiveness and arrogance. It’s a coping strategy.

I can sum it up as: if everyone is hating on me, then I have to defend myself proactively. And the best defense is to be better than the people who were making fun of me, bullying me. If I am superior to them, then what they did to me doesn’t hurt as bad somehow. But, that kind of behavior tends to extend out. It becomes easy to not just be arrogant towards the people who have bullied and harmed me, but to everyone, because everyone is a potential threat.

It’s the defense mechanism that keeps a lot of us sane when we’re being bullied and abused…but it can go too far.

In the years I was involved with that mystery school and the years after, I continued to do my personal work. I grew an actual, healthy sense of self esteem. I traded my arrogance for confidence. If someone teased me or insulted me, I would no longer lash out defensively. Instead, I’d realize that what they were saying probably was a lot less about me, and more about their own projections or issues. I got a lot more centered.

I began to be able to hear the difference between, “I don’t like what you did on ___ project,” and, “I think you suck.”

As I developed better boundaries, better self esteem, I got a lot less angry at my former bullies. I recognized that the adults around me weren’t all the kids from school. And then I began to recognize that the kids in school that bullied me, tormented me…that many of them were acting out their own issues of abuse.

That indeed, a lot of what they had done was not about me at all. I was just a convenient target.

What’s my Source?
For those many years, I had lost that energetic taproot. I was depressed a lot. I didn’t have the energy to do the big events, the inspiring events. I wondered rather a lot about where the source of my inspiration had gone, where my muse had gone. I felt I was on a desperate Grail quest, begging for the scraps of the edge of the cup to refill my heart again, to bring that life force back that seemed to have vanished from my life.

The combination of several things began to bring back my life force, my muse, my inspiration.

Changing my diet reduced my exhaustion, as did leaving an emotionally abusive relationship. But it was the years of work on building up a healthier sense of self esteem that formed the core of that. It was also remembering what it was that brought me energy and life force in the first place helped me to sink those new, healthy taproots back in. In other words, I began to remember that I used to do events that I was inspired to do. It wasn’t just that I ran an event or did a project because I wanted to show off–it was that I was genuinely interested.

And anger wasn’t bad, I realized. Anger was passion. Anger reminded me that I cared. If it was me being angry at some years-distant abuse, I had to think about what I was really angry at. If I was angry at someone for something and it turned out I was really actually projecting my anger from some long-distant wrong…then I knew I needed to look at that, examine it.

But it didn’t mean that all anger was automatically bad.

Anger
There’s the righteous anger of the activist, standing up against those who oppress others. There’s the righteous anger of the abused. Being angry at the people who abused me doesn’t make me bad.

There are all sorts of things in this world that make me angry and that I have nothing to do with that anger. I get angry at how people bully each other. I read the news or hear about people hurting each other and I am sad, hurt, angry, and it’s not something I can fix for them, not something that I can change. There are times when people have hurt me, and it’s ok to be angry at them.

I think that there’s a lot of anger that is sourced in love–and what I mean is, we get angry when something we love is violated or hurt.

I deeply believe that the most potent muse, the most potent source energy, is love. And love, passion, and anger are all a bare breath away from each other, emotionally. They make our blood pressure rise, our cheeks flush, our heart palpitate. I, in having the capacity to love, in choosing to feel desire, yearning, and passion…also have the capacity to be passionately angry when that which I love is violated.

In center of my heart I have the power to transmute my own fury into creativity, life-force. I bring myself back into alignment with love using that energy to spur me from entropy to action.

These days, I’m no longer cut off from anger as energy…I just have a far healthier relationship to my own rage. The core of my source energy  is following my calling, it’s working with the energy of what inspires me, of life and life force and love. And I’m a human being and I get angry, and that’s a part of things too.

Personal Growth: Creating New Shadows
In doing some of the personal growth work that I did, I created an entirely new shadow. What I mean by shadow is that we (humans) have basic needs. Needs like sex, food, shelter, approval, attention…except, culturally, we’re often taught that some of  these needs are bad.

When I began doing the work of personal transformation, I didn’t start out having issues around my anger. I was already using it for creative work, channeling it. But in that particular group where I did so much personal work, there was the subtle pressure that anger was “bad,” as I’ve said. So I created an entire shadow–I tried to not be angry ever. I thought that if I was perfect and centered and spiritual, then I wouldn’t be angry. That I should never feel hate.

Once I re-embraced that shadow, once I accepted that I’m a human being that feels anger and feels hate from time to time, then I could accept and love myself again instead of fighting myself. I could renegotiate my relationship to that anger.

Sometimes, I get pissed off, and I put that energy into my creative work, instead of hating myself even more for not being perfect.

Overall, I work to source my energy in love, in my calling. The work that really draws me is the work that I know is going to bring good things out there, bring some joy or serve community. Maybe it’s one of my fiction stories, or a painting. Maybe I’m teaching a workshop on leadership or running a weekend conference. Maybe I’m helping another author organize an event. When I focus on the joy, and let the occasional anger flow into the project and transmute it into something good, I feel pretty balanced.

There are times when “my hate has made me powerful.” Hate is that emotion that I feel when something I love is violated. When I need that boost of energy to make a big change in the world. I hope to help build the kind of world where we aren’t hurting each other so much. Where we try to help one another. Where we try to help heal each other.

I don’t live in that world yet, but every time I get angry, I try to fuel it into work that will help make this world a better place.

Compassion, Truth, and Bonesetting

I was taught that setting the bone is a crucial part of being a priest/ess, a leader. That sometimes we have to hurt in order to heal. And I was also taught that truth often hurts. We couch so many things in white lies to salve someone’s feelings, to soothe it over, to make it hurt less. But those attempts to ease pain in the short term often cause longer term pain. In essence–sometimes the deepest form of compassion is to say the hard thing. It hurts in the short term, but it heals in the long term.

I’ve written about the Frosts, and I’ve received a number of comments on my Facebook, and private messages, from people who feel that I lack compassion for Gavin Frost’s family by posting some reminders about their writings where they detail an entire chapter on sexual initiation of barely pubescent minors.

It’s not that I don’t have compassion, it’s that I’m not codependent. I’m not responsible for the feelings of the family members, and I certainly am not responsible for the feelings of those who support them somehow despite the horrific things the Frosts wrote. I am sorry that they lost a loved one, and I mean that sincerely. But I’m not going to lie about the Frosts just to make them feel better.

I’m reporting what has happened because it’s important to the broader community to not lie about Gavin Frost. You can’t ethically/honestly/journalistically write an article about a public figure and speak about the awesome stuff they did without speaking about the horrible stuff too. I’m not defaming the Frosts (or any other leader/elder I speak about), I’m speaking to things they wrote in their book or in blog posts, things they said in interviews.

Defamation means telling a lie, speaking an intentional untruth. It’s not defamation to speak the truth. And it’s not speaking ill of the dead to speak the truth of what that person did in their life.
My compassion is for the broader community, for the current future Pagans that need to remember our history so we don’t repeat it, so we don’t continue making space for leaders and authors that harm us.

I’ve not said anywhere that Gavin Frost sexually abused anyone, because I have no proof of that, so saying that would not be the truth. What I’ve said is that the chapter in the book by the Frosts (The Witches Bible and later, The Good Witches Bible) is a how-to manual for sexual abuse. And it’s a chapter, a guide, that Pagan/coven leaders have used or at least tried to use as a template. I personally know several people (and I know of others) who were harmed by coven leaders who were following the teachings of the Frosts.

My compassion is for the victims. My compassion is for all those who come after us who deserve better. My compassion and my love is for the community that (I hope) survives us. And my deepest hope is that this future Pagan community is not riddled with rape culture, misogyny, homophobia, nor with with unethical, harmful leaders. This goes far beyond the Frosts, but they are a part of our past, and sweeping what they wrote and said (and held to) under the rug is a lie.

I’m speaking up because people are eulogizing Gavin Frost without telling the whole story–or without knowing the whole story. What is remembered lives, and we must remember our failings as a community. One of our grossest failings collectively is failing to speak up when something’s wrong.

I don’t believe Gavin Frost was a completely bad person, any more than my ex was completely bad. People are complicated. The labels of “good” and “bad” aren’t really useful. People can do good things, and also bad things. People can be beloved teachers who helped you find your spiritual path, and they can also have taught and promoted some very harmful practices.

If you believe that I’m heartless for posting about the Frosts now, I’m not going to be able to convince you otherwise. But the way I was trained was in the magic of the bone-setting, of healing the longer term even if there is pain in the short term. That speaking the truth is healing, though it can hurt. There’s no way I can write about the topics that I do without hurting someone, but I do so with that intention of setting the bone, of longer term healing.

I don’t enjoy writing those posts about our harmful leaders and elders. Those are hard posts to write, and they lead to days of stress dealing with angry comments and hatemail. I lose friends when I post about these things. I lose paid teaching engagements. I don’t write these things without a cost to myself, but I write them because I love my community and I want to see it thrive. I want to see a healthy, sustainable Pagan community.

What is remembered lives, and we must not forget the mistakes of the past or we are doomed to repeat them.

Ritual and Chanting Prep: My Voice Warm Up Playlist

When I teach workshops on chanting, or on chanting in context of trancework, energy building in ritual, or other logistics, I talk a lot about how important it is to sing a lot and keep your voice warmed up. In short, our voices are a muscle. Don’t expect to roll out of bed and have a good singing voice, or to have a strong singing voice to lead chants if the only time you sing is 8 times a year for sabbats (or less). While I don’t sing every day, I do sing at least a few times a week. One of the things I suggest to folks instead of singing scales (which, for my part, is pretty boring) is to find songs to sing along with. 

I thought I’d include my current voice warm up playlist for when I’m in my car singing. I don’t always play them in this order, and I have other songs that I listen to in between singing to give my voice a rest (and keep me energized for the next round of singing), but this is a fair approximation of the progression.

The first three songs are the ones I sing the most commonly. I often warm up singing along to Above and Beyond – Tri-State for at least 10-15 minutes before I move on to anything else. I sing Gaeta’s Lament a lot as well, but usually not until I’ve worked out any phlegm or funk in my throat. I often can’t hit the high/sustained note at the end of the song til I’ve been singing for 20-30 minutes.

It’s worth noting that I’m doing different things with these songs when I’m doing my voice warmups. Tri-State is a really simple song as far as the melody goes, and what I’m generally doing is just singing harmonic drones along with it. Songs with long, sustained notes are easier to pick up a harmony line for, and that’s why I like this song, because I can come up with my own harmonies and even some melodic progressions that complement the song just to develop my “ear” for what sounds good. I also use that song to keep my lung capacity strong. I sing droned (long sustained tones) for as long as I can. Sometimes I can sustain a note for 30-40 seconds, which is a pretty long time.

Another piece of the warmup is that by singing long sustained notes I can get a good feel for where my voice is. At first it might be gravelly or rough. I might be congested, there might be phlegm, my throat might be scratchy. I’ll go back and forth and sing other songs and come back to Tri-State because my voice can’t really hide from those long notes. Any roughness is going to come out. When I can sing that song smoothly, my voice is getting into good shape.

I sing Ubi Caritas and Ben Pode Santa Maria to work out my mouth muscles. There are lots of percussive words, lots of mouth shapes. Usually after I sing one of those my mouth/cheeks/jaw ache just a little, so I give it a rest and go back to Tri-State, or just listen to music for a bit. It’s like stretches before heavier exercise; I don’t want to tax the muscles too much at first, I want to warm them up.

I’m also playing with harmonies with Ubi Caritas, and with Ben Pode Santa Maria I actually sing a completely separate vocal percussion piece that overlays as a harmony line. Again–I’m playing with harmonies to develop my ear to hear what sounds good, and in my case, singing things that are far lower than the original vocalists because my voice is an octave or two lower than theirs.

With Bluetech – Worthy, sometimes I just sing along to the vocals, because I love the song. Sometimes I sing one of my cantillation pieces that I composed against it. By singing totally different words and listening to the words of the song, I’m putting myself into a state of trance, but I’m also stretching my ability to handle multiple things at the same time. I sometimes do this exercise while completing a third simple task like texting someone or writing down a to do list. It helps me to sink the cantillation songs I’ve composed into my muscle memory so I can be singing that in a ritual while attending to other logistics and not lose my place.

Sound of Silence by Disturbed is one of my newer warmup songs, and I’m not great at it just yet. It’s a tricky fit for my vocal range to sing the melody, though I can sustain plenty of harmonies. It’s a good test of my voice, though, when I’m really warmed up. If I can belt out some of the high notes I’m doing well. Same thing for the Star Spangled Banner. I sing the version in a minor key (because hey, I love me some minor key) and usually the first time I’ll sing a low harmony to it. However, when my voice is good and warmed up, I’ll sing the melody, and if I can hit those high notes and sustain them, my voice is pretty well warmed up for any chant I want to lead in ritual.

I’m working up a new playlist of songs to practice against to expand my musical skills, so once I have that together and have been using it I’ll post an update.

If there’s any interest at all, I could try and record myself singing along to these so you can get a sense of the kinds of vocal percussion and harmonies that I’m doing.

Ultimately, what helps is to sing along to 1. music you enjoy, and 2. music you can sing to. That means music that works with your vocal range, or that you can adapt and sing harmony to. It also means that you want to choose music that isn’t so complicated that you’ll get frustrated. The Sound of Silence is, for me, at the upper limit of how complicated a song I can sing along to. It’s more complicated than the others in terms of melodies and words. My vocal “stretch” song used to be Enya – May it Be from Lord of the Rings, which I didn’t include here because that song didn’t actually work so well for me to practice with. Even if I sing that one a lot lower, it’s not in a good spot for my vocal range, and I’m either singing it down at the bottom of my range, or way up at the top. The only way I can really sing along is if I sing harmony to it.

I update my sing along playlist all the time, and sometimes I just sing along to my road-trip techno for a change of pace.

The best thing you can do for your voice is to sing, to practice singing, to get your voice warmed up in a gentle way, to practice singing specific songs and chants until you know them and have them in your muscle memory. And then learning to add in harmonies, vocal percussion, or other pieces to the music…to expand your breath control and lung capacity…if you keep at it you’ll learn a lot of stuff about your own voice and be better able to sustain chanting in ritual.

And truly–music in ritual, particularly chanting, is pretty much one of the most potent magical and spiritual technique that I’ve experienced, so it’s worth doing. Almost everyone can sing, and even if you don’t think your voice sounds good, probably a lot of that is because you aren’t singing. Give it a shot; you’d be surprised how good you can sound if you’re regularly singing. I know I was; I used to be the tone deaf girl encouraged to sing quietly in grade school.

PS, if you like any of these songs, go on and pick up their works! It’s easy to find places you can buy their CDs or mp3s with a Google search.

Music, Magic, and Life on the Road

My posts have been sporadic, and I apologize for that. As a writer, it’s really tough when I’m not able to do that writing thing. That being said, my past months have been chock full of new experiences that will give me writing fodder for months (and years) to come. I’ve been traveling and teaching at different festivals and events, and recently I’ve really been upping my game as a musician and connecting more with other Pagan musicians.

In fact, I am looking to host regular chanting/music circles in the southeast Wisconsin area, or within a couple of hours drive. (Interested? Contact me at Shaunaaura (at) gmail (dot) com) And I have it in mind to formally create some kind of trancey Pagan band/choir thing. I’m also looking at buying a few additional musical instruments slowly as I can afford them, and working to learn to play more of them. Or at least, get better at it. Frame drum, bodhran, more gongs..

This past week at Summerland Spirit Fest in Wisconsin, I learned a few things. I know a lot more about music than I thought, and my voice is a lot better than I thought. I also learned that I have so freaking much to learn about music, but it really is calling to me.

Ultimately, I’d love to compose and create music with others. A band, a choir…not sure what to call it. And yeah–not that I needed yet another creative project, but I feel that the work I’ve been doing has been building up to this, I just needed a little bit of a push from some experienced musicians to tell me I have the chops to pull it off.

So–special thanks to singer/songwriter/guitarist Brian Henke for pushing me to take that next step and encouraging me…and for dragging me up on stage to sing backup vocals for his most excellent Raven King song.

And thanks also to Tuatha Dea; I’ve been on the festival circuit for a while with them and we’ve interwoven on occasion with them supporting my rituals with drumming, but it was great to get a peek into the creative process. And Kathy–many thanks to you for saving my voice with your “Entertainer’s Secret” throat spray. My voice was about toast by the last night of the festival and I had to lead a chanting-intensive women’s ritual, then lead the energy chant for the combined attendees of the men’s and women’s ritual when we rejoined after. I caught the festival crud and the damp nights were not kind to my throat, but I learned another singer pro-tip in the form of the throat spray. Just ordered my own bottle for emergencies, too.

What I really loved the most about hanging out with the musicians at this festival was the spirit of collaboration. The other musicians were willing to answer my newbie questions about the various musical techniques they were employing or their processes. The music I know for leading chanting is different from performing songs, so I was working to be a sponge and absorb as much as I could. In fact, the musicians remind me a lot of the community of romance novel authors; it’s also very collaborative and supportive. With the musicians, there’s not really a sense of competition, even though each musician depends on CD sales to get paid for their time.

Instead, they’re looking for how to support one another and help, including helping those who are just stepping into musical work. I had offers of all sorts of help including folks from Murphy’s Midnight Rounders that agreed to teach me a bit about sound engineering theory so I can better use applications like Audacity to record and edit my own work.

One of my favorite moments of the festival was when a bunch of the musicians were just jamming. The Night Travelers had to leave before the fest was done (I imagine they had another gig to get to.) The banjo player for Night Travelers is rather famous as a banjo player, and I can see why. The guy has fingers that just fly and he’s inexhaustible. So a bunch of the musicians were all hanging out in the main lodge/hall of the festival, jamming until the wee hours. I finally had to bail at 2 or 3 in the morning since I had to be up and teaching in the morning, but it was pretty cool to experience. Other musicians were joining in with guitar, and I joined in with some harmonies.

And there were lots of other musicians collaborating as the fest went on. Beltana Spellsinger, Ginger Ackley, and Mel Dalton did a concert together, and pretty much all the musicians did some kind of collaboration as the week went on. I also got to hear musicians composing and working out new tunes and debuting them, which was pretty spiffy.

Some of the songs were exactly what I needed to hear in that moment.

I left Summerland Spirit Fest with my cup absolutely full. In my workshops, I had people asking great questions and diving into the singing/chanting techniques, and people working to support that in the rituals I led. In fact, right now it’s a little bittersweet since my brain is buzzing with things I want to write about, music I want to sing…and I instead am focusing on managing my next travel engagements.

Right now I’m very aware that I live in quite a liminal space. I’m an introvert, and all this travel has been really hard on me. It’s affecting my body, mind, and spirit health. And all the traveling means I have almost no time at all for writing. On the other hand, the work I do is by its nature collaborative and requires connecting and networking with new people. Our voices can’t harmonize if we aren’t in the same place together. So I both crave and dread the travel and the connection, and I’m working to hold that paradox.

I’m also in the liminal space of having so many creative projects I want to work on, and only so many hours in the day. But I’ve been seeking joy for the past years, and I’m getting closer to it. Music is part of the fire that lights me up, that’s for sure.

In the coming months as my tour season winds down (August is Texas, Kansas, Missouri, and Memphis, September is Virginia and New York and Ohio and maybe Indiana) I’m going to be looking for ways I can better balance some of this. I’m looking to plan a lot less travel for next year if I can find ways to bring in enough income to keep me afloat, and spend a lot more time writing, and also practicing as a musician and connecting to other musicians.

In short–I like my alone time, and I have a desperate need to hibernate. I need my focus time to write and create. But, I also love that collaborative nature of music and ritual. I can’t sing harmony by myself. So I’m out here actively looking for musicians (or people who want to become musicians) who are willing to devote the kind of time and energy to really build skill and make the music manifest.

I’m sure I’ll be writing about some of this more coherently when I’m not recovering from one trip and prepping for the next, but I’m trying my best to at least get a few thoughts down as I go along. More magic, more music. More time. Gods, for more time.

Boredom and Side Conversations in Ritual

Another common question I get from people who lead rituals is, “How do you get people to stop having side conversations in ritual?” Truth is, I don’t often have this problem, so it took me a bit to figure out some suggestions I could offer. However, then I went back to some of my early training in rituals and remembered that most of the logistical problems in any ritual (or other facilitated activity) are resolved by skillful setup at the beginning. There are a lot of common ritual problems I don’t run into because I always start with a pre-ritual talk.

Pre-Ritual Talk

Confidence and Presence

Shutting Down Side Conversations

On Bad Cons & How You Kill An Event in Advance

On Bad Cons & How You Kill An Event in Advance

Singing: Discovering the Magic of Music

Music in ritual–and in specific, singing–is probably the most potent magic I know. I’m sitting here trying to get all the final prep done for Pantheacon, as I leave in just a few hours. Part of my prep for any event is warming my voice up because I know how crucial it is to be able to have a strong voice to anchor the chanting. And when I travel and teach, I’m singing for days as I lead workshops and rituals, so I need that prep.

I had to rediscover music as an adult, and now it’s one of my great joys. In grade school I had a hard time in music class singing the right notes. I didn’t understand until a lot later that it was partly because of my allergies, but also, my voice was too deep to sing the “girl” parts. I couldn’t sing the high notes so I’d sing off key, and I was admonished to just sing quietly, or just given that “look” that told me I didn’t sound good but they weren’t going to say anything.

Creativity and Fairytales

On Monday I’ll be posting on Patheos about creativity and obsession, and specifically referencing an event I decorated with a fairytale theme. I thought I’d put up a few images from that event. I’d love to host a masquerade ball in the Chicagoland/Milwaukee area; I certainly have the decor for it!

Here also are some pictures of all the new blue decor set up as ritual altars. I have enough for an entire Grail temple at this point!

Book Release: Pagan Leadership Anthology

I’m very excited to announce the release of the Pagan Leadership Anthology. Taylor Ellwood invited me to co-edit this anthology with him almost two years ago, and it has finally come to fruition! Helping grow more resources for Pagan leaders is a passion of mine, and this anthology is priceless for all the collected wisdom it offers from many different leaders, many different traditions, and many different perspectives.

As I mention in the introduction of the book, sometimes the advice offered in one essay conflicts with what’s offered in another. The authors don’t always agree with each other, but you’ll still see some common patterns of experiences of what works and what doesn’t. The best part of this anthology, for me, was reading the experiences of the various authors. What they went through, the mistakes they made, and how they grew from them and came to learn better ways of leading.

Most of the authors have offered some version of: “I wish I’d had a resource like this when I was starting out.”

The Pagan Leadership Anthology: An Exploration of Leadership and Community in Paganism and Polytheism

Edited by Shauna Aura Knight and Taylor Ellwood

The words “Pagan Leadership” are often met with scorn and tales of failed groups and so-called Witch Wars. And yet, as our communities grow and mature, we find ourselves in dire need of healthy, ethical leaders. Most Pagans have seen what doesn’t work. But what does?  This anthology features over thirty authors, thirty essays, and decades of leadership experience sharing their failures and successes as leaders as well as showing you how you can become a better Pagan leader. Below is just some of what you will learn when you read this book:

• Why personal work will help you become a better leader
• How to become a better communicator
• When to deal with predators in the community
• How to resolve conflicts peacefully
• Why you need bylaws when you build a group
• And much, much more!

Pagan communities are evolving. To be an effective leader you need to know how to take care of your group and yourself. In this anthology you will get tools and techniques that work and help you become a better leader as well as enrich the overlapping Pagan communities.

The Pagan Leadership Anthology is available as an ebook and in print. Ebook: TBA  Print: $18.99 Immanion Press  | Amazon  |  Barnes & Noble

Topics include:

Group dynamics, conflict resolution, mentoring, egotism, creating community, burnout, communication, healthy boundaries, delegation, crisis, power, volunteers, personal work, leadership models, bylaws, sustainability, processes, responsibility, ethics, dual relationships, collaboration, scapegoating, visibility, transparency, fears, resentment, self knowledge, discrimination, ageism, exclusion, empowerment, respect, organizations, sovereignty, growth, vision, uprisings, triangulation, service, expectations, projection, betrayal, healing, restorative justice, longevity, tradition, innovation, dedication, teaching, ministry, pride, developing skills, learning, administration, authority, integrity, compassion, social skills, truth, blame, shame, hypocrisy, gossip, safety, harassment, avoidance, tension, problem solving, relationships, transformation, failure, success, strength, sacrifice, support, mistakes, forgiveness, organizing, event planning, outreach, education, transference, professional, self-care, instability, confidentiality, money, equality, partnership, politics, reflection, investment, controversy, challenge, social justice, values, privilege, unity, skill-building, vulnerability, judgment, attitudes, social norms, silence, assumptions, discomfort, accountability, cliques, punctuality, removing members, pedestals, control, weakness, consent, misconduct, infrastructure, fatigue, thriving, complaints, participation, stewardship, structure, confidence, fundraising, feedback, identity, stubbornness, rejection, discernment, inspiration.

Immanion Press is a small independent press based in the United Kingdom. Founded by author Storm Constantine, it expanded into occult nonfiction in 2004 with the publication of Taylor Ellwood’s Pop Culture Magick. Today, Immanion’s nonfiction line, under the Megalithica Books imprint, has a growing reputation for edgy, experimental texts on primarily intermediate and advanced pagan and occult topics. Find out more at http://www.immanion-press.com.

Pantheacon and ConVocation Schedule

For those of you attending Pantheacon in San Jose, or Convocation in Detroit, these are the places you are likely to find me. I have my specific workshops, rituals, and book signings that I’m offering in bold, and in italic I’ve highlighted any workshops that are focused on a project I’m involved in, such as a book launch for an anthology.

For those of you who have attended events like this, or are thinking about it, I thought I’d also mention some of how I list things on my schedule. Events like this get overwhelming and I’ve found it helps to not only schedule my time teaching or attending workshops, but to also specifically schedule social time with people I want to meet with. I also plan ahead for times I’m likely to be too tired to attend a workshop or ritual; I put question marks by these items. I work to carve out “blank” places in my schedule so I know when I might have availability to schedule a lunch/dinner/talk with someone.

Pantheacon

Thursday

6-9pm Registration
3 pm Early Bird Social
7–9 pm  All Pagan and Polytheist Meet and Greet
4pm-7pm ADF Suite
9pm Early Bird Evening Gathering

Friday

12:30 PM Opening Ritual
–Drop off books in Vendor Room
1:30 PM Connecting to the Soul’s Wisdom with Hypnosis (Brenda Titus)
3:30 The Outer Circle: Marginalization Within Paganism
5:00 Dinner with Patheos Pagan crew
7:00 Finding Your Personal Magic
9:00 Possessing the Dark, the Art of Choreolalia Ritualistic trance dance?
9:00 pm (til later) Gina Pond/Heretics @ suite

Saturday

9:00 am The Dark Side of Druidry
11:00 am Black Lives Matter: Restorative Justice for Healing and Change
12:30 pm recording podcast
1:30 pm Godless Bless: A Panel on Atheism/Agnosticism in Paganism
3:30 pm Chanting, Trancing, and Story: Ritual Techniques that Work
5:30 pm Book Signing in vendor area
7:00 PM Gender Diverse Pagans: Inclusivity or Hospitality
9:00 PM
11:00 Crossroads of Memory: A Trance Dance Ritual?
Facets of Freya: A Devotional Ritual in Honor of Freya?
12:15 Drum Jam?

Sunday

8:00 Voice warm up
9:00 Sacred Sound: Advanced Chanting for Rituals
11:00am – 1:00pm – Trance Roundtable (ADF Suite)
1:30 pm Pagan Consent Culture (Christine Hoff Kraemer in the Assembly of the Sacred Wheel suite)
3:30 pm Radical Inclusion for Pagans
3:30 pm Bardic Magic by John Beckett (ADF Suite)
5:00 pm
7:00 pm Creating Culture of Consent: Sacred Sexuality
9:00 pm Matronae Oracular Devotional: Dancing at the Well?
11:00 pm Mother of the New Time (Bloodroot Honey Priestess Tribe)?

Monday

9:00 From the Holy Mountain to the Sacred Cave: Journey of Descent
–or, prep for Sacred Fire ritual
11:00 Sacred Fire: Keepers of the Flame
12:30 pm Closing Ritual

Convocation

Thursday

3pm-7pm Setup art in art show
7:00 pm Opening Ritual?
8:00 pm Tentative: Pre-conference discussion/workshop for small group, TBA
10:30 pm Thursday Night Drumming?

Friday

9:30 am Climbing the Tree of Life
11:30 am Navigating the Pagan Blogosphere (Patheos crew)
1:00 pm
4:00 Body Stress Ecstatic Practices
5:30 Dinner with ____
10:00 Hel Invocation
Friday Night Drumming?

Saturday

8:30 Voice Warm up
9:30 am Sacred Sound: Dynamic Chanting for Ritual
11:30 am The Star and the Grail: Lighting our Way on the Hero’s Journey
2:00 pm The Writer’s Craft?
4:00 pm Sex Magic in the Northern Tradition
7:00 pm Summoning the Swan Maidens: An Exploration of Inspiration and Sensuality
9:30 Drumming?

Sunday

9:30am Rebirth: Pagan Leadership, Ethics, and Community
12:00 pm Encountering the Runes
1:30 Art Show Takedown