How did They call you?

[victoreia]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

[Asch]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

Honestly I think %99.9 of people never do experience a direct interaction with deity.

[monsnoleedra]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?..

Well for me the one who has been with me the longest is Artemis.  I was still a child pretty much when I was walking down a mountain trail.  I rounded a blind in the trail and came face to face with a deer.  We stood there staring at each other when I heard and felt a voice say "I am Artemis and you are mine!"  That occured around my 10th birthday near as I can recall, I'm now 52 so its been a good number of years she's been with me.

Hekate was a bit different.  She was a shinning woman who I ran into often in dream time or felt was watching me.  One day I had an exceptionally vivid dream of this woman, mid 20's, surround in a silver / golden glow with two torch heads sticking up behind her back.  It was on a forest trail and we walked until we came to a Y shaped cross roads at which time she vanished.

It would be a number of years before I put a name to her.

Bast and Pahket were a bit different.  I was off the coast of Africa in the mediterrian sea on a six month deployment.  For a number of days I keep seeing the image of a large cat upon the face of the moon or in the shimmering heat waves.  Then on the night of the fullest moon I can recall I saw her face upon the moon then had her visit me in dream time that night.

What made that so special was on that same voyage Artemis appeared to me in a number of persona's in different area's of the med.  I saw her as the Ephesian Artemis as I was in that area, as the Orthian Artemis as we participated in a fleet exercise in that area, as the Tuarian Artemis while i was in the Black sea.

What further made it so special was it was the final deployment I would make in my Naval career before retiring.  It marked the transistion point where Sekor and the Huntsman started to step away and Artemis and Hekate would step back into the main influnce in my life.

So basically Artemis in my youth until I enlisted in the Navy.  Sekor and The HUntsman during the 23 years I served in the Navy and spent in service to my country.  They also were the main influence during those years.  Then Artemis, Hekate, Bast and Pahket as I left the warrior's path behind me.

[Adder]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

I've had 2 which fit into a category of pointless to question authenticity, but various other lesser experiences. The first major one was a particularily rich sleep paralysis where I saw and interacted with whats best described an Angel, including touch. I consider it different from other sleep paralysis I've experienced because the clarity was higher and the creative detail was astounding, so much higher depth and detail. The second one was a booming female voice which delivered a premonitory message which was clear, definitive, accurate to within 3 hours and not possibly known otherwise. Due to the nature of the first interaction I tend to classify spiritual energy a little differently and only have one Goddess, of which all existing variations are facets of that singular... again just my belief and I could be completely wrong. My practise up to that point was quite generic, and more about developing personal spiritual sensitivity and connectiveness to the broader energy of living beings.

[DashesAgainst]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

 

Apollo- I kept seeing references to Him everywhere.  Granted, I know His name is very common (especially in its use for commercial purposes), but after seeing it over a dozen times in one day, I began to suspect something was up. Then He came to me in a very vivid dream, and confirmed things.  

He also let me know in the same dream (although I didn't realize it at the time) that Poseidon was going to play a major role in my spiritual life.

Poseidon - He came to me in horse form, in a "vision", as I was drifting off to sleep.   I can't remember what I was thinking about at the time, probably just letting my thoughts wander, then out of nowhere, this horse image popped into my mind's eye.  He later presented himself in human form in (once again) a very vivid dream.

[Tay Redgrave]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm going to try to answer this the best I can. For the first one, I don't know. I'm still trying to figure out if Dionysus was around before he made himself known. The only links I have is a name (Dicyous) and the feeling of a presence when I was 15 until the age of 18 (I think it just started to happen less frequently.). However, when I begun following/working with Dionysus, that presence (from what I notice) hasn't been showing up anymore. While I do feel something once in a while, it usually feels like Dionysus more than anything. I usually feel rather calm when he's around.

The presence, from what I know and remember, felt male and rather pleasant. I usually understood it as a deity. Whenever it appeared, I always smiled. So I suppose it did have a calming effect in that way. If also might not have liked it when I came across the JOS. I have a sneaking suspicion that it was the same being who slammed the cupboard doors when I came across the website and when I got—sadly—involved, it popped around far more and started to appear less when I finally snapped out of it. Afterwards I started trying to deprogram myself and fix myself.

As for the second part, that can be answered quite easily. I want to mention that his name started to pop up a bit more frequently in conversations with a friend, and when I came across a thread on another Pagan forum regarding him, I had a strange dream that mentioned him in it. The dream involved me dancing in the backyard (nekkid), not giving a damn who saw me, really. It had a feeling of unrestricted freedom. In the dream, his name popped into my thoughts. Why? I dunno. The dream has some Dionysian quality to it, though. A lot, actually.

Sometime afterwards, (while doing some work with his brother) Dionysus pops into the picture and 'claims' me.

.. probably not satisfying answers.

[starlilica]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

Honestly? Very upfront dreams. I've received dreams from Persephone, Hades, Odin and Freyja. But in these dreams I knew who They were, and Who I was in contact with. Now, I will be the first to admit that the dreams might be my own subconscious, but I believe they weren't. I also didn't ask for the dreams, I didn't meditate or pray or do anything before them - they just came to me.

Sorry I'm not very helpful =/

[Ghost of the Navigator]

Honestly I think %99.9 of people never do experience a direct interaction with deity.

 
There is a part of me that agrees with you and another part of me that feels the reason that is, is that 99.9% of us aren't listening for a response.  I am speaking metaphorically here, but communication between a mortal and deity isn't quite what we are used to experiencing.  Often the response if your deep in mediatation could be images or feelings or a smell that ignites a memory.  All and all its your interpretation that will make sense of it.

[Asch]

There is a part of me that agrees with you and another part of me that feels the reason that is, is that 99.9% of us aren't listening for a response.  I am speaking metaphorically here, but communication between a mortal and deity isn't quite what we are used to experiencing.  Often the response if your deep in mediatation could be images or feelings or a smell that ignites a memory.  All and all its your interpretation that will make sense of it.

 
I'm not dismissing anyone's experiences or revelations etc. just saying that direct interaction is rare, for instance I don't consider a dream etc to be direct interaction.

[Juniperberry]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

I've written a response to this countless times but I've always deleted it because I wasn't sure of exactly what I wanted to say.

I've always maintained that I wasn't called by the gods, but the story of how I came into heathenry sort of contradicted that.

For a really long time I was just a philosophical pagan. I went through the whole rigamarole of deconstructing my concept of God and religion and the world and I had some interesting experiences and light connections.

I knew, though, that I wanted something with tradition, something that touched on my roots and something that had depth- I wanted to go beyond 101 discussions and beyond what I came up with on my own.

I had heard of asatru through-out the years and wasn't the slightest bit interested; it was too masculine, too aggressive; too Viking-ish. For about a year I wasn't anything, not even philosophically pondering. I finally made the decision to look into heathenry- and not just look but only look at that.  And then I still did nothing, though I would think about it now and again.

One day I was driving home with the White Tank mountains in front of me on the horizon and I got the over-whelming sense of silence, the type of silence that actually says so much... and for one moment I knew what it felt like to be alone on earth save the  heavy and surrounding presence of a god. Just me, the land, the horizon and something moving through it all.

I went home to look it up and, true to my word, focused only on heathenry. I didn't get caught up in looking at multiple pantheons and trying to find the exact perfect deity  for me and my experience. It was heathenry or nothing. I found Vidar, the silent AS, and never looked back. I didn't question it, didn't say he wasn't exactly right for whatever reasons, I just went with it.

So one could read that and say I was called- but I wasn't. That's not the way it works, in my beliefs. The gods are alive, they exist, but they haven't been following me since birth and guiding me anywhere. I wasn't heathen, I wasn't part of that community. They didn't have a personal interest in me like that. They can't read my thoughts, see inside my soul, and they don't know my future anymore than I do. So I wasn't called.

But I think we can be touched. (And that was the word I needed to finally post this.) We're probably touched all through-out our lives by these spiritual abstractions that move through the world, but sometimes we don't see them or hear them or make a choice about them. This time I did. I found myself open and in the wake of one and I followed its trail. Vidar might not have even  had a clue I tagged alone until I started paying honor.

And if I hadn't committed to heathenry, that moment would have come and gone with me trying to define it *exactly* and bouncing across religions and philosophies.

So, Tl;Dr version, it was all a choice on my part.

[OpenHands]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

 
Dreams initially.  Then a few years later when I was a pagan seeker, I asked the presence that I sometimes felt who they were.  I got a name and it went from there.

[FantasticSpastic]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

 
For me, while in meditation, I heard a woman's voice speak to me.  Saying that she was proud of me for my great maternal instincts and strength, and how she knew she was right to have faith in me.  Naturally, I thanked her, and when I asked her what was her name, she responded Hera.  But it's interesting because I've received responses for when I reach out to Gaia, and they seem incredibly similar.

[Misha]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

For me it started with a general pull towards Celtic dieties.  I started reading up and was very interested in Brigid.  One day while pondering whether Brigid was the diety for me I heard a very distinct voice say, "She wants you but first and foremost you belong to me."  I knew instantly that it was The Morrigan which of course as a newbie pretty much scared the snot out of me.  Since then I have always honored them both with the understanding that The Morrigan #1.

[ZombyFrogg]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

 
I used to have an interest in Greek Mythology when I was around 12, I read waht was available to me at that age. The interest never went away but kind of got pushed back. In the last couple of years everytime I hear a mention of the Greek deities Artemis is the first I think of. Her name became the name of a character in a story I have been writing, and ave found that she just randomly pops into my head when I am doing normal stuff like grocery shopping. So I am guessing she is trying to get my attention.

[KittyVel]

How did a Deity (or Deities) make Her/His/Their presence(s) felt? How did She/He/They make you aware of Her/His/Their interest in you?

I'm curious, because while I've had an interest in various Goddesses, I've never gotten a feeling of one of Them metaphorically grabbing my hand/ear/scruff of the neck and saying "pay attention!"

(By interest, I mean, I was curious enough to read what I could find on (for example) Artemis, Bast, or Isis. But it was more a casual curiosity, and not in-depth research.)

 
I always had a fascination with Anubis, literally as long as I can remember.  He has always been so fascinating to me, and has always been a part of my life (even though I have only just recently looked back and realized it).  Around a year ago, He subtly made Himself known in my life when my boyfriend took the name "Anubis" in the bedroom (it is even engraved on a tag that he wears on a collar).  At around that period of time, I decided to work on a painting dedicated to Anubis for an art class I was taking.  Unfortunately I was never able to finish it, and I don't have the materials to do so, but one of these days I'll try to take another shot at it.  I also started researching Him more, and started wondering how He was worshiped.  Then about a month ago, He came to me in dreams two nights in a row.  After that, I really started looking into Ancient Egyptian religion and took a liking to it.

As for Sekhmet, Mafdet, and Bastet, I looked Them up out of simple curiosity and decided that I wanted to try to build relationships with Them.  I have yet to officially work with Them, but as soon as I can get my altar and offerings in order, I will get to work on that.