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[email protected]An Atheopagan Ritual Primer: https://atheopaganism.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/an-atheopagan-ritual-primer-v4.pdf
S2E27 TRANSCRIPT:
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Mark: Welcome Back to the Wonder Science-based Paganism. I'm your host Mark.
Yucca: And I'm Yucca.
Mark: Today. We're going to talk about sacred space. What it is, how to create it and how to, to build sacred space into your own home.
Yucca: Exactly. And we'll also get in to a little bit, building that in, in shared spaces. Because we know that a lot of people are in situations where they share space. First of all, but might be with a roommate, a dorm mate, you know, parents, spouses, anything like that. And they may not be in a situation where they're one, their aesthetics, but also their beliefs are shared.
Mark: Right. And so, it becomes sort of a threading, the needle process of you know, how do you get your needs? While also accommodating the needs of the other people in your household. So we'll be talking about that some as well, but let's start with just what sacred space is because that's, it's a little hard to define.
In my experience, sacred space is the environmental conditions that facilitate my moving into a ritual state of mind.
Yucca: Okay.
Mark: And that typically includes things like low lighting levels like candlelight aesthetically pleasing and metaphorically, symbolic objects and decor might include music that is facilitative for that.
And personally, I, I like to live in sacred space. I, I decorate my room in a manner that is. It's kind of like a temple in that way. It has, you know, amazing sort of masks from all over the world on the walls and various, you know, pieces of art and symbolic objects and candle sticks and cauldrons and stuff like that.
Yucca: Mm. Yeah. So I, I think I share your, your idea of sacred space as a space that can help move you into that ritual space. And that really just influences the way that we feel. It's something that I'm very aware of because one of my parents was an architect. So I grew up on job sites and building and all of those things.
And so the shape of the space, the feeling of the space is, is this something always present and. The awareness of just what it feels like to walk into one room versus another room or one building versus another, or to step out, it really, really changes our moods and just our awareness of the world.
Mark: Yes. Yes. And I think this is something that we often don't pay much attention to. We just kind of slide on through our passage from space to space without really acknowledging how it's influencing our our psyche and our emotions. But. As we've said over and over again, a big element of being a science-based pagan is learning to pay attention and being aware of our environment.
And that includes the built environment. It doesn't just include the natural environment. It includes the built environment. You know, we live in houses and apartments and, and, you know, various places.
Yucca: RVs. Yeah. Yeah.
Mark: And in some cases, tents.
Yucca: Yeah.
Mark: Still we live in constructed spaces and our ability to make those spaces feel good to us is
Yucca: True.
Mark: something we have choices about.
Most of us have choices about. And so over the years I have collected various pieces of artwork and Furniture items and so forth that speak to me of a particular aesthetic. And I deploy those in my room in a way that kind of augments the alter that's sort of the centerpiece of it, the focus And so at night I can put on some music and light some candles, and I'm really most of the way there into the ritual state before I even do any breathing exercises or visualization or any of that kind of stuff.
Yucca: Yeah. So it sounds like you're, you're describing. Space that that you're stepping into. Well, sometimes some people are lucky enough to be in a position where they get to actually design