The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

I have this kind of half formed thought that if you are doing something with your body, eating, exercising, pampering yourself etc, and you are in the right head space then maybe you can pass those feelings/experiences  through to your blood ancestors in some way.

Does this make any sense? Have any basis in reality?

 
That...makes a lot of sense, actually. Theoretically, if one had strong enough ties to one's ancestors and was sufficiently focused, I don't see why it *couldn't* work.

*makes note to try this at some point*

Ancestor work has become a big part of my path, I give offerings, I write poetry for them, I involve myself in activities that are relevant to who they were.

I have this kind of half formed thought that if you are doing something with your body, eating, exercising, pampering yourself etc, and you are in the right head space then maybe you can pass those feelings/experiences  through to your blood ancestors in some way.

Does this make any sense? Have any basis in reality?

 
I started working heavily with my ancestors too. Right now, I started onmy blood relatives but I really want to extend to the land where Im from (which is a lot) and where I live now. So the offerings and activities towards my ancestors will add up. What youre saying sounds like a good and practical idea.

I read this article called Five Ways to Honor your Ancestors: http://ancestralmedicine.org/five-ways-to-honor-your-ancestors/

One way is to do things in the name of them. So, those simple things like you mentioned can be done For them.  Like Im trying to get back to excercising. I know my grandmother would want me to be as healthy as I can be so Im getting enough motivation to do that for her. While my other grandmother, ironically enough, told my mother "some people need make and some people dont need make up. You, my dear, need make up." My grandmother was saying that not everyone can go without make up. So pampering yourself and dollying yourself up for your ancestors especially if they make statements like that is all good too.

I mean, we can give but so much incense and light so much candles until we stop and say hey, let me do something a bit more beyond the altar. "Off the cushion" stuff.

Thanks, do you have a specific way of getting into a head space for it or do you just do the thing and know the ancestors will receive it?

 
I don't really have a specific procedure, though if I'm doing it deliberately I tend to try to be mindful about it and use my awareness cultivation?


Um.  There's a story though.

My first experience with death was of my grandfather (my mother's father, and I'm pretty sure you can fill in the relevance there), who went West when I was eight.  One of my greatest regrets for a very long time was that I had not been able to interact with him as an adult.

Twenty years after his passing I made it to the oracular seidh put on by Hrafnar at PantheaCon.  (For those who aren't familiar with seidh, it's a practice involving trance journey with a visionary, in which one can seek contact with gods or the dead.)  And I asked if the seidhkona could find my grandfather so that I could ask for his blessing.  It was a little fussy getting there (the seer had a relative that shared a name with mine) but I asked him to grant it.

And the thing that he told me, through the seer (and some of the vocal cadences were things that I remembered from childhood, so I believe it to be true connection with his spirit somewhat more than half the time), was that the way I could best honor him was to live a good and happy and whole life.  And I've taken that to heart, really, that to the extent that I can live well, and pass on living well to others, I heal the ways in which my ancestors were unable to live so well.