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"How did you know Odin wanted to marry you?" is a question I get quite a lot.  Often it's asked because people are trying to figure out what a particular god they're involved with wants from them; other times it's simple curiosity--which is understandable, even these days when every other blog I look at seems to have a godspouse behind it.  (I sometimes fool myself into thinking that means there are a lot of us, but in actuality we are still a rarity within the whole pagan demographic. What it really means, perhaps, is that I need to branch out and read a more diverse selection of blogs. )

I was 35 years old.  My daughter was a teenager and I was in a marriage that was okay at times but felt emotionally abusive at times too.  I had been more or less a Wiccanesque pagan since the age of thirteen, but hadn't really had close relationships with any particular gods, except that for my entire life, for as long as I could remember, I'd had the sense that someone was watching over me, that some unseen Person was walking along with me and shaping my path and my life's experiences.  I first encountered Him consciously at the age of eight when I met the Wild Hunter—the ancient, raw, savage Power that I discovered hiding behind the mask of Santa Claus that Christmas—and from that moment I knew He was there and had always been there with me.

[Cross-posted from my primary blog by request.]

First, an announcement: as of today, January 1st 2013, I will no longer be available to answer either seidhr or divination questions along the lines of "Does Deity X (fill in the blank, but Loki and Odin are the usual suspects) want to marry me/sleep with me/date me?" or even, "What does Deity X want from me?" in which the unspoken subtext is, "Does He/She want to marry me?" Once again, any seidhr questions or reading requests that follow some variation on this pattern will be refused, and a link to this post given.

This includes any similar questions that I have already tentatively indicated I would try to respond to, as of this date.

The reasons for this decision are many, and frankly they include the preservation of my sanity, since in the past couple of months this has become the most popular variety of question sent my way, not only for seidhr but just randomly dropped in my inbox via email or Facebook, even after I had posted a notice in the sidebar of my blog, months ago now, that I would not be able to answer ANY free questions outside of my regular posted seidhr schedule. Even being in the midst of Yule, the holiest time of year for me, or days before my 10th anniversary in one instance, has not hindered people from doing this or prompted them to consider that perhaps they should wait, that perhaps their approaching me at such a time might be inconsiderate or disrespectful. It has seriously been annoying enough to make me consider putting my seidhr practice on hiaitus altogether for a bit, and I was set to do exactly that until I saw how many people I was able to help in unexpected ways during the Samhain and Yule sessions (this last being one of the primary reasons I began my oracular practice in the first place).

The root of the problem came out during a discussion with Jolene the other night, and was echoed by a recent comment someone else posted to my blog: entitlement. Too many people among the newest crop of would-be godspouses and spirit workers apparently feel somehow entitled to not only have the help and guidance of those who have been on this path for years, but to have it now, on demand, when they are ready and not when the other person is ready to help them (assuming there is such a time; please see further below for more on this).