How did you learn of Paganism and decide to follow it?

[Starlock]

Hey... nothing wrong with resurrecting an old thread if it is a good one! It beats creating repeat topics... though sometimes fresh discussion is good, it is also good to read what has been said on a topic before, eh?  

[Jezehbelle]

Rioto_Kish

Jezehbelle

A lot of resurrected threads lately... o_O;

Oh gods, I DID IT AGAIN!!!!! gonk *Bashes head against wall* I keep resurrecting threads, because I'm too much of an idiot to actually read the date of the last posting!! gonk gonk gonk

It's okay, I'm semi-new, so all of these are new to me. surprised

sweatdrop  

[AFK Masturbating]

I agree. Gives something for newcomers to talk of. 3nodding

And now, for me.

I've always been intrigued by all manner of myths, folklore and legends, with the Norse being my primary interest. Just as a forewarning, I do tend to be a bit romantic/fluffy at times, and don't quite know all in respect to the Asatru faith. sweatdrop Still, one must respect the tenets of honor and such that is spoken of therein. 3nodding  

[Anabis]

Well, I kinda... didn't get a choice x3

Christianity was attempted to get forced down my throat by my Grandmother and often used as punishment, which mean not even going to the bathroom sunday mornings unless you could open the door without being noticed O.o hard to do.

Greek was a huge topic of interest, and during a net search of Death Gods other then Hades, Up comes Anubis' name and.. well... There's actually a drawing that goes with this O.o

http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/41454472/

Links to deviantART, one of my own pics. ^^; Don't hurt me! O.o *hides from art critics* I know its terrible and there are about half a dozen mistakes, I just don't feel like redraaawing it. *clings to Anubis Plushie* Mrr.  

[PoeticVengeance]

The great thing about constructing a new zone of Paganism with the help of a few others is jokes like this:




hehehe, Nihl you crack me up  

[ILuvEire]

My Mum got me intrested. She was from France....and where she was had very little respect for any religion. When my Mum was about 16, HER mum got into it, finally getting MY mum into it...then she just brought me up with Pagan beliefs!

My Dad on the other hand is very odd. "Technically" his parents were Catholic, but they imparted a lot of Pagan beliefs onto him...and his parents always seemed sick when it was time to go to Mass. He grew up in Ireland (as did I!)

SO I have been around it all my life...we went to HarvestFest this year!! It was really cool!  

[Redwing~Shadow]

I never really had a true religion thought I was always tempted from others to be Christian. I went to church, pretened to prey, and never say a point in it. Accually the religion scared me. I would be in a church class, which i was made to go to from my mom when she wasnt so crazy. They would read from the bible and discuss how ceritan sins can get us to go to hell. Im thinking in my mind that ppl out there in the world do stuff like that all the time. Does that make us all bad ppl? It made me feel bad. So I just stopped listening to them. I belive I started getting into Wicca and Pagenism in 7th grade when I met a Wiccan that was in one of my classes. That was also when I noticed some ppl getting into the the goth style, which I didnt see the connection. But I looked up more on the religion and saw it to be a more free religion and I didnt have to be ashamed of being myself. But as I noticed later in my first high school they took wicca as a style and made it look like u had to be goth to be one. But whatever. I decided to follow under pagenism because not only do u have the choice to belive what you want, it helps find more about yourself.  

[Miss Jetpack]

My "converting" to paganism is all due to one lovely invention: The Internet.

I wasn't religious to begin with, granted I started studying paganism in 2nd grade (I was very curious anyway, and an internet addict, it wasn't that hard to 'stumble upon'). Of course, my family is very confused religiously. We are apparently protestant christian, but we dont prey, go to church, anything like that. We went when I was very little, but only on easter for the egg hunt or when there was a potluck, mostly because my cousins own the church and we didn't get to see them often. Another uncle of mine owns a catholic church, for that matter, but my mother always told me 'catholics are weird' and left it at that. But I was never taught anything about the bible, or if I was, I never listened. The only things I knew about the bible I learned from cartoons and school. Which is pretty strange...

Anyway, after that I always believed in many gods and was always into occultic things like tarot and spellcasting. I only attempted to become truely dedicated to wicca a few years ago (freshman year of highschool) and gently found out... that it just didn't feel right. I guess thats why I didn't get into it before. But, while I was set on being dedicated, I found a site (I think it was... e-cauldron), that I discorvered hellenic polytheism. And I had always been interested in greece so I dicided to learn about it on an edgucational stand-point. By the time the gods were answering me, I knew I was there.

Of course, I discovered The Principia Discordia a year before that and it changed my life, but I take it very philosophically and don't consider it my true religion.  

[Juna Lu]

I have the great honor of being brought into paganism by my mother. Though I supose its not realy paganism since I don't belive in polythiestic dieties... just that all dieties are apart of one great over soul. ^.^ my mothergot into herbalism in the mid ninties and thoguh she is crazier than I am and misinterprets how things realy work Shes were I got into it. I then Met a freind who realy got me into stuff...not good stuff -.-;; but alls well that doesn't kill you, no?  

[Creepy Albino Fish]

Quote:

Though I supose its not realy paganism since I don't belive in polythiestic dieties... just that all dieties are apart of one great over soul. ^.^

Don't worry Juna Lu, I believe in something like that. =]

I don't really think I have a big story on how I got into paganism. It was more of a gradual realization. I was always close to nature. I virtually lived in the mountian behind my old house and animals like me a lot. Plus I read a lot so pagan-like things would be mentioned so I'd dig a little deeper her and there. I think it was three years ago when I took my first trip to Salem. We were visiting my friend's aunt's house who lives there and she took us for a tour. I picked up a book Green Witchcraft by Aoumiel. It was interesting, but it wasn't for me. It got me interested in similar things. I got more and more books, reading up. 3 or 4 Cunningham books (I like his a lot, though he had a bad editor, there's so many spelling mistakes XD ), Totem Magic by Yasmeen Yalenorn (awesome, btw), The Element Encycoledia of 5000 Spells (good history on the occult), plus numerous others. One night while reading The Wicca Handbook by Eileen Holland it was amazing. I had to stop reading because I was filled with such joy, I actually cried. I knew I found what I needed. I'm not saying I believed everything in that one book, but it told me that I was on the right track.