sobekemiti:

sphinxliike:

sobekemiti:

sphinxliike:

idi-the-noof:

sphinxliike:

Anyone have any tips on how to get in a good head space before approaching a shrine? 

I’ll use my seperate Amun shrine as an example here instead of my larger Kemetic Orthodox Senut shrine.

First I decide if I need to do a full ritual purification shower or bath. As someone who is chronically ill this can be a huge energy suck that leaves me clean but without energy to do shrine. So I might wash my wands and mouth with natron water, put on deoderent and brush my teeth. Then I pick out what ritual white I’m going to wear. I have a few options, from a very simple one I made myself(basically linen folded over with a head hole) to my much nicer ones I’ve ordered.

Once dressed I put on Amun’s playlist as I gather up the offerings. I focus my mind on how I am upholding a tradition that was done by great ancestors such as the gods wives, Hatshepsut and others. I then bring the offerings into the room where the God’s shrine is. Walking down the long hallway with offerings, in my whites and ritual jewelry with soft music playing helps a lot. Currently the shrine in my living room because someone is staying in the guest room where it is normally located. Then I approach the shrine, set the offerings down and spend a few minutes just breathing and focusing on that before I started

Would the Gods mind if I was unable to shower? I am similar, it takes a lot of spoons from me just to shower some days. Would showering the day before, then doing the deodorant + others be okay too?

Thanks so much for the tips 🙂 I am fairly new to shrines and how to approach them, at least within Kemeticism ~

For basic daily rituals, I wash my face and hands, clean my teeth, gather my water libation, and go to shrine. I don’t dress in robes, I don’t prepare beyond what I need, bc these rituals aren’t the fully formal stuff I do, otherwise they would not get done every day.

For formal ritual, I do the full ritual shower and purifications, clean my teeth, dress in my whites, maybe meditate beforehand, prepare offerings, and go to shrine. It’s a lot more involved, bc it has to be for formal ritual.

I wasn’t aware there could be rituals and formal rituals so this is good information to know 😮

Every Kemetic will split formal/informal rituals in different ways, but it is a thing, and it can be useful. Some people prefer to do more formal rituals every day, but not everyone is up to that, or wants to do that. That doesn’t make informal daily rituals less effective. If it helps you go to shrine every day, so be it. That’s what works.

For me, particularly for daily rituals, I know I won’t get them done if I do them the way I do my formal rituals. This is honestly why I never did Senut on a daily basis, back when I was KO. The purifications and the ritual took about 40 mins, and I just couldn’t make a habit out of that every day. Like, it’s a lovely ritual, but I kept worrying about what I was going to offer, and trying to time it around my shower, and it just ended up being too much work to do daily. But that doesn’t make it a bad daily ritual, just one that didn’t work for me. Some people really dig that formality, and that’s awesome.

But for what I do now, I get up, brush my teeth, wash my face, and go to shrine. Without meditation, it takes about 10 minutes, and I can do it when I get up. It gets done every day. I’ve also started washing my face before I go to bed, as well as brushing my teeth, as a mirror of those morning purifications.

I keep my formal rituals for festivals or other special occasions, when I have the ime to really prepare and do longer, more involved rituals. For formal ritual, the ritual purifications are a ritual in and of themselves as much as the formal worship part is. So in a way, you’re doing two rituals. And honestly, that formal purification ritual can be amazing to help you get into the headspace to go to shrine, and is well worth doing.

But if that’s too much to do every day, don’t do it. Do what works for you, even if that’s just washing your face and brushing your teeth. If it helps you manage going to shrine every day, do that. It’s enough.

There is definitely not enough spoons or time in my body to do a formal ritual every day (even though I aspire to be able to do that at some point, I just lack a lot of concentration, due to ADD). So, knowing this is very nice and handy. Being able to Shrine is comforting so I will have to attempt this!