Day 16 - Other Paths I've Explored

I've been pretty happy being an eclectic Pagan for the fact that not everything in specific spiritual religions fits my needs. I may agree with certain aspects of some systems, but the system in its entirety doesn't mesh with my spirituality.

Other Paths I've explored:

I've really only explored two spiritualities as I considered my possibilities. I'm not Italian so Stregha didn't make much sense; I'm not Scandinavian so Norse Heathenry didn't make sense to me, I'm not African nor Haitian, so Hoodoo/Voodoo didn't make sense to me either.

The groups I was a part of mainly spoke of Wicca and Eclectic Paganism. Many of them talked about RHP (Right Hand Path) and LHP's (Left Hand Path), and felt more comfortable with so-called "RHP", only because I was fresh into Paganism and didn't want to play around with negative entities or ideas.

As I continued to explore the various Pagan spiritualities out there, I started with Wicca. Yes, it interested me, and still makes much more sense than any other system out there, but I find myself disagreeing with many aspects, and can't seem to reconcile these disagreements. Mostly ethical.

Ethics seems to play a big part of whether or not I want to be a part of a specific system. I've also looked into Satanism, but more out of curiosity, rather than an interest for my spirituality. I wanted to better understand Satanism rather than go off third- or fourth- hand knowledge so I looked into the main websites. While for the most part, it has little (if anything) really negative associated with it. It has nothing to do with the stereotypical ideas like "living sacrifices" or "orgies" (as almost EVERY Pagan system is associated with), and more with living life for yourself, not taking crap from others, respecting others if they respect you, etc. Though I more disagree with their ideas that if someone annoys you, to "treat them cruelly and without mercy". Seems a bit harsh to treat someone like that who is simply annoying you. I'm more interested in saying "you're annoying, go away". It's little things like that that turn me off towards Satanism.

Wicca is pretty self explanatory if you look at my blog and some of the posts and pages I have. So you really know my stance on it and my experience with it.