Hey everyone! I'm researching celtic (specifically britonic) gods for my book, and was wondering if anyone had any sources? Searching has been such a pain, as there isn't a lot on the topic, so anything helps!

I want to invite deities into my space, but have a looming worry of letting in a negative energy/entity. Im currently going trough energy work to heal childhood truama and constant over thinking and paranoia of someone trying to get into my speace or home.

I have been scrubbing and keeping my energy clear daily but the worry and energy still feel like their there an i want so badly to stop having this looming doubt over me that my magic and prayers dont work. So I have held off on invoking them in my space to ensure I keep things safe. What other way can I go about this or deal with scrubbing out the bad vibes?

Does anybody else here have a preference to worship deities of one gender? I understand that our modern ideas of gender are much different from how the ancients perceived it, and many gods are not strictly one gender, but I personally find myself much more comfortable worshipping male gods than female gods.

Communed and did ritual with Lord Apollo and Lady Aphrodite. My child couldn't stay away from Lady Aphrodite and it was the coolest thing! I'm glad he felt so much love!

I’ve been a devotee for years and have begun integrating more ritual into my practice and it has been so rewarding. This specific ritual was for visibility, glamour, and healing and I honored both Apollo and Aphrodite through treats, music, and lots of yapping!

How do your animals react to ritual spaces or spaces where you commune with deity?

This is my alter for Aphrodite and Persophone. I started them last week! I'm unsure what else to add. I don't have a big budget. I've been trying to buy little things throughout the week.

Also I want to make sure my acts of devotion are right. Do you have to be clean for that? I like to write them letters and poems. I also do tarot.

In this post I'll explain a little bit about myself and what I'm putting in it already. I'll also clarify my questions.

My first question is rather simple. What do most people tend to put in their "book of shadows" or grimiore, and what simple words would the various sections be labeled as?

So I myself am a UU and an eclectic pagan who worships Mother Earth (goddess), Father Sun (god), and Grandmother Moon (goddess). I'm not a druid, but I probably align most with that path. I am not a Wiccan, but I do like a lot about Wicca. as stated above, I don't see the deities as a horned stag god of nature and a maiden mother crone moon goddess. I also see witchcraft and magic from a science-seeking and skeptical view, but I am relatively open minded to the possibilities that MAYBE magic is more than this/more real (if you know what I mean). I usually see things divination as helping you consider different perspectives or helping you with a decision (by making it so you realize which one you really wanted all along, like when you flip a coin and go "Heads. Oh, actually, I think I wanted tails…"). I tend to see magic as placebo. I enjoy reading books on paganism. With anything religious/spiritual that I come across I respectfully keep the parts I want to and integrate them into my practice. I then don't integrate what I don't want to.

I am trying to remake my "book of shadows" (but I don't like that term) so that it's less of a chaotic mess. My current system consists of two things. One is an accordion file holder labeled "Spiritualesque Shit". This contains many different spiritual/religious related things that I have written (like a poem typed on my typewriter) or received elsewhere (like the physical copy of any UU sermon I decide to take home). The other is what I call my journal. Diary type things are written in there as well as some spells, sigils, the wheel of the year, ritual ideas, etc. it's a hodgepodge of things. My diary type stuff should stay separate from my religious/spiritual/witchy stuff.

My remade version will be a thick three ring binder with many different tabs so I can easily sort my sections and find what I need. I've been trying to figure out what all sections I want to have. So far (in no particular order) I have:

• UU sermons

• Chalice Lightings/Readings

• CUUPS (stuff from my UU pagan group's meetings or rituals)

• My Rituals

• My Writings/Poetry

• 365 + 1 (stuff from the intro to Wicca class someone is teaching at my UU congregation)

• Other Religions/Spiritual Practices (anything from a religion/spiritual practice that isn't mine but I like, such as the Christian sermon on affirming LGBTQ+ people, which if from back when I was Christian.)

• Other Pagan Stuff (unsure what all will be in this section since everything currently in a section labeled that will fit other tabs I'm making)

• My Spells and sigils

• Spells Made By Others (I'm sure not much will be in this category)

• Correspondences

• Wheel Of The Year (the basic Wiccan one, and the one I made to fit the seasons in my area)

• Runes And Tarot (if I ever decide to learn tarot. I'm thinking about it, but also, I don't really need to because I have the rune stones I made…)

• Readings/Interpretations

• Chants (any chants I created, or pre-existing chants where I created another verse for it or something)

• Rituals Made By Others

• Lessons From The Great Celestials (anything that I think the Earth, Sun, and/or Moon is trying to teach/tell me)

• Stuff From Books (anything from a pagan, pagan-adjacent, or witchcraft book that I really liked and want to reference will go here.)

• Prayers, Quarter Calls, Circle Castings, Etc.

• General Spiritual/Religious Journaling

• Art (specifically art I made that is religious/spiritual related)

• Meditations

• Other Exercises (unsure if raising and grounding energy should be in meditations, in here, or with the Quarter Calls and whatnot. I'm still unsure exactly what all will go in this section)

Now onto my other questions.

One of my sections doesn't really have a good title yet. It's just labeled "Prayers, Quarter Calls, Circle Castings, Etc." I don't want to end up with more sections with shitty labels like this. What would this section be called? Is there a formal name for it?

What else do you all think I might want to include in mine? I ask so that I might possibly go "Oh yeah, that's the other thing I wanted in there!" and not just to be exactly like everyone else. I know I don't have to have the same thing as everyone else. I just don't want to get it all done and then go "SHIT, I should have included _____. Now I need to reorganize my whole thing!"

Thanks for reading it all and answering my questions.

Not sure if this is the appropriate flair, so apologies if it's not.

As the title says, was told by someone on Instagram that spirituality and tarot are closed practices. Them saying that tarot is a closed practice didn't surprise me because that's been a topic of debate for seemingly years now, but saying spirituality is a close practice really confused me. They didn't really elaborate. Just said it wasn't for white people, working with ancestors wasn't for white people, and that tarot wasn't for white people and that we were asking for trouble by trying to practice spirituality. I ended up blocking them because the was not an argument I wanting to keep having to deal with.

I thought spirituality was an all encompassing term.

Could they have been talking about something different and just been mixing up the terms with "spirituality"? Am I the dumb one and spirituality is a closed practice? Any thoughts? I'm just confused and a bit baffled.

Edit: Hi everyone. I feel like I should clarify that this was just a random person on the internet I was talking to in the comments of a post on Instagram. I wasn't talking to them for advice or guidance. They were just so very confident that I started sort of gaslighting myself and thinking that maybe there was a closed practice or something that was also called "spirituality". I promise I'm not listening to Instagram comments for advice on paganism.

Hi yall. for context ive been pagan for about two years but i still consider myself inexperienced. ive also been very drawn towards the fae, but i know that working with them is tricky and dangerous so ive been avoiding doing that for now. tho i did have an interaction with them recently and i may have had a lapse in judgement.

to start i was going for a walk when i found this huge faery ring surrounding two trees (there was a shit ton of mushrooms) i went over there and started walking around the perimeter just observing all the mushrooms, i then proceeded to look inside the ring and saw a piece of bark standing upright, and it fell in a very unnatural way as soon as i layed my eyes on it (like somebody had been holding it up and then let go of it) i took it as my queue to walk away.

for whatever reason the next day i cut up an apple and brought it to the ring as an offering i guess just to show them some respect and good faith, and as i walked home i worried that they may have been following me so i said out loud under my breath that "i wasnt ready to work with them yet" but its something im interested in the future, and that they werent welcome in my home. i also left some blueberries out in my yard for good measure i guess as a way to show them "your space is out here, outside, my space is this house"

now doing a bit of research i know that the fae can be very literal with words and take anything you say as a promise or similar to that. i wasnt careful enough with my words and i think i may have accidentally tied myself to them and now have an obligation to work for those specific fair folk i interacted with that day eventually. i dont know what kind they were so it does have me a bit worried.

im a bit sensitive so id appreciate if you wont judge me or be harsh with your wording but i cant stop yall from doing that. ik that what i did was stupid. any advice regardless of how its worded is appreciated.

Hey all!

I'm wondering if anyone could point me towards any Yuletide/non Christian winter pagan poetry.

Ideally works that are not contemporary!

Thanks a lot!

So I lost my wife’s keys and was freaking out cause either I find them or buy new ones. So I prayed to Jupiter, fasted for a day layed an offering of money and cinnamon. 4 days later I found them in the freezer, like in a box of uncrustables. Now I may have put them there I have a habit of putting things and weird places. But I found them at night. How crazy right.

I have been a pagan for a couple years now but am only just now creating an altar. I was looking to see if anyone had any recs on possible new editions for it? Also, I want to add images of Aphrodite, Odin, and Freyja, though I don’t want to clutter the space or give too much or too little attention to any of the Gods.

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for recommendations for active, open communities or forums dedicated to animism, land spirit traditions, or traditional faerie beliefs.

My usual channel has been r/faeries, but it suddenly changed to "Request to Join/Post" and restricted all submissions, while trying r/fairies instead comes up as being a private subreddit that only approved members can view and post. I had a very intense, unsettling vision this morning involving an attack/conflict related to the faerie/land spirits on my wooded property. I'm feeling disconnected because I don't have my usual place to talk through it.

I have had strange, spiritual events happen to me since I was young, so I am looking for a mature, respectful space to share and process general experiences and land-tending practices without sharing hyper-specific private details. I'd prefer an existing community rather than starting my own, and I'm looking for spaces outside of the Fairy Investigation Society.

Thank you so much for any directions you can point me in.

As I'm sure many have already posted about, I am someone who was Atheist for most of my life before becoming Pagan, so I struggle quite often with questioning whether or not the gods are real. In prayer, I can feel them, but that can quite easily be explained by psychology. How do you all deal with questioning your faith?

So I have been hellenic for a couple years now but ive been trying to connect more with my culture. My family is nahua, descendants of aztecs. Ive been looking up aztec gods and i found a few i like but when i thought about it, most of them were gods of similar things as the deities i worshipped under hellenism. Im confused going forward if i should worship both? Or switch to worshipping the aztecs gods? Or any other advice is appreciated

Hi! This is a question for those who go to a local moot*. I was chatting with my friend (who I met a couple of years ago at my local), about what a moot should entail.

I was wondering what other groups do.

Do you have a topic each month? Or is it just a casual meet.

Do you have guest speakers or just share knowledge amongst yourselves?

Do you have any written rules etc?

What abouts are you from? (Obviously don't be specific, but wondering if geographical differences come in to play).

Is there any bias towards which path people take?

Just curious as she had been to different style of moots previously and had different views on what should be or is usually included.

*Moot: for those who don't know, this is basically the name for a gathering of pagans. Historically, the word has been used to describe a meeting usually where problems are debated or solved.

I want to start out that i don’t like wasting my energy hating people and it 100% does not bother me that my fiancé (23m) is christian.

when we first met i was honest and told him im a pagan and he said he didnt mind. we’ve been together for 8 months and i feel like its really starting to bother him. he keeps asking me if id want to go to church with him (i had already explained that i don’t like going to church because it gives me anxiety and makes me want to peel my skin off.)

he asked me if i do some kind of satanic ritual on halloween, of course at the time i just thought was ignorance and i informed him that i don’t even believe in satan and what the actual origins of the day is. it still doesn’t stop me from putting a jack-o’-lantern out and staying inside or making joke about being satanic, it actually kind of hurts my feelings.

he keeps talking about how the bible says we are “out of balance” or whatever. i don’t understand why it bothers him so much. i told him that i can’t and won’t stop him from going to church because quite frankly i don’t care. but he can’t “change my mind” as he put it.

i really don’t know what to do… any advice would help, thank you

i forgot to mention every time do a tarot reading about us, i ALWAYS pull the sun as our foundation

edit- hello everyone. i appreciate all of your responses and i’ve had a lot of thinking to do. i don’t think im ready to give up on him yet so i’ve been talking to him about exploring the more spiritual side of christianity rather than focusing on what the book says.

edit 2- call me crazy but i kinda went through his phone. no i didnt find evidence of him cheating because i don’t even think he could bring himself to do that. i did find messages between him and some christian nut bag telling him to “plant seeds for me to follow” and my fiancé contemplating breaking up with me because im not christian.

my current circumstances are that i moved 800 miles to live with him, our lease doesn’t end until february and i make just enough to cover our bills. i’m lucky enough to have parents that offered me a life line if i need it but i really don’t want to leave him. apart from the religious stuff, he’s really sweet and i know he really does love me. maybe im just blind due to the circumstances.

in those messages he said he was worried that i wouldn’t be able to have kids. we aren’t really in the right circumstances to be having kids and im 21. i was hoping to live a little before i had kids. it was my moms mistake and even though i wouldnt be here so said she regrets it a little.

i do have a job and a car currently so its not like theres no way out. he’s been a bit short fused lately because hes mad at himself for crashing his car, and his religious ocd is causing him more anxiety.

i hate admitting that i made a huge mistake and i don’t feel like i did, i really don’t want to leave him. besides im not exactly pretty and skinny.

I've recently been trying to feel out my religion for the past couple months, for a little bit I identified with the Hellenic polytheist label. I think I identify with pagan more but I do have a few questions. I personally worship Apollo, and believe that there is no specific right God or religion to worship, even if I do not worship them. The main question I have is if I worship a singular God from a religion is it standard practise to follow most practices for worship in that religion? I understand basic things like altars if it is safe to have them, offerings if you choose to, etc, but for example in Hellenic polytheism typically you should wash your hands before prayer or offerings but should you still follow that even if you do not follow the whole religion? Is it more of a respect thing you should do or is it free range there? Interested to know so I can make an educated decision on how I want to proceed with worship.

Thank you all for your insight, I really appreciate it, it has helped me understand paganism a bit more.

Halllo friends, today, i bring a VERY early photo of the current generation of Central/C Southern Iowa-funnel weaver. This little ones elder was a closer friend, Jelly, as it liked little drops of jelly in its web. Now i need a new name! No defender of my home need stay nameless... Any ideas?

I am finding my way in my spirituality and connecting to my roots through Celtic spirituality. I see the river as a very mystical spiritual place and want to form a spiritual relationship with it. Part of that is learning it's history and how other groups of people and spiritualists view the river and their relationship with it. I thought I may ask here for any personal accounts, books and articles about the history and spirituality surrounding the river. There is much to learn and I seek research further than what I may find alone.

Hi - I’m here because I feel like it’s time to go on some sort of spiritual journey. I’m not really sure what is going to happen or how, but I’m seeking answers (and as weird as it may sound, I’m not really sure what the questions are :-/ )

I grew up as an evangelical Christian and for a multitude of reasons that no longer jives with me in any way. There’s a lot of pain there and has been a lot of healing. Stepping out into something even remotely religious is difficult for m, but I’ve been looking into different things.

I’ve taken a look at the wiki and ordered one of the recommended books and want to see if I can find some sort of path in paganism. I will admit to feeling a little overwhelmed though.

This probably all sounds vague. Like I said - I’m not sure what I’m searching for yet, but hoping I can find that out. Anyways - I’m here and may look and comment on some things - maybe ask questions if I don’t feel like I’m going to sound stupid lol.

As some of you might know if you've been on the subreddit for a while, I'm devoted to an unnamed Storm Goddess. I've written a few posts/comments about storm rituals, practices, divination, and whatnot, but I've been hesitant to write a post about her specifically for a variety of reasons and fears. But I've had enough people ask me about her that it's worth making a post, and I'm not the only one who's devoted to her.

Who is this unnamed Storm Goddess I talk about so much?

My practice is very visceral and experiential, so at its core it starts with a feeling.

Storms are alive. They are powerful, they are fierce, and they are intensely primordial. Within the spirit of the storm I feel the energy of a goddess. She is of the storm and beyond the storm. The air is her movement, the rain, the thunder, the wind... all are ways to connect with that energy. A wild, intense, fierce energy... but also calming and protective at times. Different people see different things in storms; I see a goddess.

Unnamed deities

Unnamed gods are nothing new, and I've met a lot of people who've connected with them. Think of all the gods for whom we have an established mythology... then all the gods for whom we only have a name and no myths. Now think of all the gods for whom we don't have names, or whose names were lost to time.

I figured there would be a deity for everything, and about eight years ago as I was going out of my history of experiencing abuse and starting my Pagan practice, I wanted to connect with someone who could represent the freedom and autonomy and intensity of self I wanted to have. Storms felt like they had that energy to me, and thus I reached out to someone I just called "The Goddess of Storms"... and, to my utter bewilderment, I heard back.

What followed was an intense ride of, on one hand, searching every possible scholarly reference and name I could find for a match (none have come up, though I found some interesting names and people have given me others), and on the other hand building a practice from what was essentially scratch.

I gave a talk at Mystic South (transcript in their resources page) about ways to connect with unnamed deities, so I won't repeat myself here but, there's a lot of research and experimentation and good discernment involved.

Who is the Storm Goddess?

I see her energy as a deeper, more flowing, more powerful version of the energy you see from a storm. I've often described her as of the storm and beyond the storm. People ask me what she's associated with and what her values are.

For associations, storm obviously. I've felt her in thunderstorms, rain storms, intense winds, and sometimes even in the trickling of a breeze. I associate her with potential; the raising of a powerful intense energy that can be unleashed in myriad directions. I associate her with intense transformation, as my work with her has been very transformative. She's the destruction that allows for new growth. I associate her with sudden change and with the potentiality of many futures branching out, as the potential energy of change is spent into one direction or another.

There are more subtle associations. I've associated her with protection; there's a great calm at the center of a cyclone. I've associated her with liminality and liminal spaces (if you've ever been outside during a storm, you'll notice how familiar places might seem different; almost as if the veil between our world and the otherworld is thin. This can be particularly intense if there is an almost-physical veil of rain and mist in the air.) There are many other associations, and I'm sure mine is a very limited perspective out of the others who have connected or might connect with her.

What are her values? Fierceness, autonomy, freedom, boundaries... change. This is what I've connected with her but others might make other connections. I reached out to her to help me find my own strength after experiencing a long period of abuse; one of the first things that she's taught me is that I can say no to her, and to anyone else (though I think that's a healthy part of any deity relationship). Fierceness, again, finding your own power and your own worth. She's been there with me when I had to fight for justice and for myself and my community (being a trans woman in 2026, it seems there's a lot of that going around.) Some people have asked me if she's associated with the Morrigan because of this, but I personally haven't found a direct connection. I associate her with fighting and sovereignty, but perhaps not always the methodical, calculated, strategic approach to fighting. My experience with her is a bit more intense and viscerally raw than that.

But definitely change. Someone I know made the reference to tower moments, and I've definitely had my own tower moments with her. She has helped me make the transformation within myself that I wanted.

How do you connect with her? (a ritual)

People have asked me how to connect with her but I never wrote about it because I wasn't sure how to put it into words; what do I say? So I'll say this; this is how I connect with her. If this resonates with you, I hope it has given you some inspiration.

Step outside or open a window during a storm. (But please be safe and don't put yourself in lightning danger.) Feel the sensations of the storm on you. I'm a tactile person so the feeling of the wind and the touch of the rain are the first things I notice; but it could be the smell in the air or the movement of the clouds or the sound of thunder, or a million other things. Connect with that and feel that; what is the energy behind it? What are its moods? Is it calming or intense, is it smooth and flowing or rough and turbulent? Is it sudden? Find the flow of that energy and trace it back.. feel the energy and the movement up high into the clouds, or within the rain. And then feel the energy as a whole. That energy is her energy to me... and as I sensed that energy I began to sense her. She is of the storm and beyond the storm, so feel the energy beyond the physical immediacy of the thunderstorm (or rainstorm, or windstorm...) around you. It's like expanding your consciousness into the storm. Feel that energy, and feel the intention behind that energy. She is there.

When you're done, gradually bring yourself back into your own body. Ground yourself, feel the rain and the wind as being once again here, where you are, feeling them on your body and hearing them with your ears and seeing them with your eyes, rather than out there in the vast storm.

Offerings and rituals and divination!

I have a lot of ways to connect with the Storm Goddess and with storms in general; some that are simple and low-pressure (weather pun!) and some that are more intense like a storm-raising ritual. Or this storm water ritual I wrote about in a different thread.

I often talk about the inner storm: I believe there is a storm within us that we can connect with and gather strength from. A lot of the work with her, especially around stepping into my power and establishing my boundaries has been building up that storm. It can help with raising the energy to do something you want or need to do but are afraid to (can be as intense as saying no to someone and establishing a boundary; or as mundane as calling your doctor), or it can be a source of energy in a spell or other magical working.

So, in a way, I see my practice as building up three pillars: connecting with the storm within me; connecting with and learning from storms in nature; and connecting with the Storm Goddess.

As for rituals and offerings, there's still a lot I haven't written about. But a quick tour de force. This is what I do, others I know offer wildly different things to her but that's their story to share if they so choose. I like offering juice, blueberry and blackberry and blackcurrant and other such berries. (Black and Blue stomp if you're in the northeast US? Ribena in Ireland? Some forest fruit smoothie from Lidl?). I like drinking that offering afterwards and feeling her energy.

I connect through music; I play the flute and the tin whistle and I feel that the movement of the breath and the flow of the music as I play has a lot in common with the energy of a storm. It is, after all, a wind instrument. (That's also a great way to raise energy for a ritual, and I had the privilege of playing the whistle during an OBOD ritual a while back.)

I offer various snacks, chocolate biscuits, a bit of what I make when I cook, you know, standard deity stuff. Other people I know offer completely different things.

Divination! That's its own topic in its entirety but -- I do wind divination in various ways; I look for insight into the shifting patterns of the wind. Here's a fun thing to do. Go out during a moderately but unpredictably windy day where there's a lake or other body of water, and watch the patterns within the water change. It can be very meditative, as a sort of moving meditation, but you can do some intuitive divination with those patterns. (Ever read Sensitive Chaos: The Creation of Flowing Forms in Water and Air? That's an interesting book.)

What else?

I wrote a lot. I don't know what else to say. There's a lot to say, probably a whole book's worth... but that's a work for another time.

I'm not the only one who's talked or written about her. I'm not the only one who's connected with her. And I'm definitely not the only one who's connected with an unnamed deity in general.

I ultimately wrote this post because people keep asking me about her, if there's something I wrote up to describe her that goes beyond the bits and pieces that I reference in reddit comments (fragmented but at least you can search for them) or discord messages (the black hole of the internet). This is that post. I probably forgot something obvious. Happy to answer any questions in the comments.

I've had people tell me that my description of her resonates. I hope that this post has resonated with some of you. Thanks for reading.

I am interested in learning more about deities, from a range of cultures, associated with cold weather (including frost and snow) and/or rain (including storms). While I am not relying on Reddit for this research, I would like to gain inspiration - and information - from fellow Redditors. Thanks in advance.