My Path to Odinism by Hveðrungr Bjarnason AOR

[Hveðrungur Kveldúlfsson]

This is something I have talked about posting for some time now, I originally wrote it a few months back but finally decided that I wanted to post it. So here it is......


My Path To Odinism
The Story of an Odinic Re-Awakening
By Hveðrungr Bjarnason AOR

My path to Odinism is one that I have learned from talking to friends is not too common among our folk so I have decided write on it and to do my best to explain the details which brought me to our folkway and opened my eyes to now become part of Odin's Holy Nation. My path to Odinism started around the winter of 2002 when a friend from Holland got me into the "Viking Metal" music genre and more specific the Norwegian Viking Metal group Einherjer (No, it was not Hrothgar :p). I had always had an interest in Vikings and Viking history due to my Icelandic heritage. When I was a child my Grandfather would tell me and my cousins stories of Vikings, now I know most of them were stories he had made up himself to entertain us children in the evenings but none the less its the main thing that sparked my interest. I had always enjoyed reading things on the Vikings and being a big music fan I really enjoyed the Einherjer and other Viking and Norse Mythology lyrical based music my friend had introduced me to. After a while I started reading more into the lore and about the gods and deeper into Viking history. I came across a page on the internet talking about Thor's Hammer pendants found in various places in Sweden, Denmark and Iceland and why the Vikings and many other northern folk wore them, it was a part of their religion and more so their whole beliefs and life. After that I decided I wanted to have my own Mjollnir pendant to honour my Icelandic ancestors so I ordered one and wore it every day. At this point I was aware of Odinism but did not really look too much into it besides reading the Lore and the stories of our Gods, taking them only as fairytales meaning nothing but entertainment. I was not at all in any interested in any religion, growing up in a Christian family and not being too fond of that "religion" or any organized religion at all the older I grew.

So then I went on till summer of 2003, not really looking anymore into Odinism or any religions at all, reading the occasional news story on Vikings, Viking artifacts found and listening to and getting more into "Viking Metal". Around this time I was lost in a deep bout of depression and questioning my worth on this world due to personal problems and loss. One night while extremely depressed I went for a walk with the intentions on ending my life, deep into the woods then later across a giant tall grass field until I reached a area near one of the lakes in my community. I lay on the rocks beside the shore contemplating my life and for the first time in my life, thinking about seriously ending it. So as I am laying on the smooth rocks that line the lakeshore it starts to rain, this was a hard heavy rain. I started walking home as I had decided I did not want to die, at least not that night. While I'm walking through the field I started to hear thunder and saw lighting in the sky. As I was getting closer to home it started to rain heavier and heavier, the thunder got louder and the lightning in the sky seemed "closer". For some strange reason I started to feel somewhat scared and ended up running the rest of the way home, while coming out of the forest trail and onto the main dirt road I started running faster, as I was running my Mjollnir was bouncing off my chest and kept hitting me in the face so I held onto it and kept running, partly because it was hitting me in the mouth and because of the fact I did not want it to fall off and lose it.

While running home and holding my hammer I felt a giant adrenaline rush through my body, one I had never felt before. This rush went from the tips of my toes, to the top of my head and everywhere in between, the whole feeling hitting me caused me to trip and fall flat on my face into the mud on the side of the road. I got up and still felt this rush and ran the rest of the 6 or 7 minute walk (in this case run) home. When I got home I put my clothing into the wash and had to sit in the shower because my legs and arms were shaking. At the time I thought I was having some sort of mental breakdown because of my depression and feelings of worthlessness. I had this feeling for a good 40 minutes that night, running home, in the shower and a little while afterwards. After my shower I sat in my room trying to calm down but couldn’t, I could still feel the lingering effects of the rush I had felt a little while before, the tips of my fingers were numb, for that whole night I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t even lay down or rest, I was restless and hyper beating on my punching bag and walking around in my room not being able to relax. For the whole day afterwards I had energy that I felt at the time I shouldn't have had, I knew I should have been tired for not sleeping the whole night but I wasn’t tired. The day was like any other day; nothing was different until later that night when I went to sleep. While asleep I had dreams I have never had before. They went from one setting to another, I saw men around a fire near a shoreline eating, I could see longships in the background, three ships as I remember it, swords, shields, men with beards wearing furs with primitive steel and rock looking Mjollnir pendants around their necks different than the one I was wearing but Mjollnir pendants non the less. They were speaking a language I didn’t understand which I later learned from a friend living in Reykjavik Iceland that this language was indeed Icelandic or something close to it due to the way of speaking. My dreams would go from seeing who I knew were Vikings and Northern folk from long ago around a fire eating and talking to women and children cooking fish over a fire again, speaking what I again have explained earlier to be Icelandic or at least a old form of the language. The strangest thing about the dream was the fact that I felt I knew these people, a feeling deep inside me told that I knew them but didn’t know them, their faces seemed so familiar to me in my dreams. The dreams continued every night for a few weeks then stopped for months but every now and then I get visions in my dreams of Vikings and women with children, of ships and villages. I talked to my family about the whole situation and they all thought I was crazy, my own mother even asked me if I was on ***** because of the whole situation with the adrenaline rush and telling her the feelings I had afterwards, of course I was not on any *****. So there I was with no help, understanding or any kind of support from my family in finding out what these dreams meant.

After a few months of wondering what my dreams meant I started to read more into Asatru/Odinism and the religion of my ancestors online, through the Asatru Folk Assembly and Odinic Rite websites I had decided that these dreams and visions I had been having along with my whole experience with the almost hour long adrenaline rush were the gods and my ancestors calling to me. I shortly after read and studied more on Odinism, the runes, ordered some books and got deep into it. After a good 5 or so month I realized that Odinism was a part of me, the religion was something that as a European was part of who I am. With the help of my good friend Jay Ashman who is also a member of the Odinic Rite and the co owner of the Odinism message board we have built at odinist.com I have been able to meet fellow Odinists and Heathens from many parts of the world and have gained a greater understanding of what our folkway really is. It is something that lives within my genetic makeup. It is something that is a part of me and something that I am now happily and peacefully a part of. I still don’t totally comprehend what my dreams meant but I feel I was called upon by the gods and by my ancestors to do something positive for my folk. The more I grow and learn as a person and Odinist the more I believe that.

That is a short explanation of what brought me to the folkway and kept me here. For the first time in my life I feel like a complete person at peace with a lot of things that have happened in my past that I was not at peace with before. Every day I am alive I feel things get better, there are setbacks but I am constantly striving to be a better person for myself, my family and friends. I am a happy man and I can now say I am an Odinist, I honour my ancestors, the earth and the gods of my blood. I now live for my Faith, I live for my Folk and I live for my Family. I am an Odinist and proud of it.


Hail The Aesir! Hail The Vanir! Hail Odin, Freyr and Thor!
Hail Our Northern Folk and Hail The Odinic Rite!



- Hveðrungr Bjarnason AOR

[TruGunny]

I don't know how else to put it.. your experience was something i could only wish for. I have had dreams.... very realistic, 3D-type dreams.... I woke one night, KNOWING that there was someone or something in the room with me.. I heard someone call my name, only it wasnt out loud, it was in my head, if that makes any sort of sense at all. I felt then, and I still feel today, that it was Thor, watching over me. letting me know that I was safe. at the time, I was in an extremely abusive relationship, and I slept very lightly for fear of being stabbed in my sleep. the overwhelming feeling of "safe-ness" or of being protected is something I have a hard time describing. That single incident gave me the strength to leave the relationship and be more strong in my own self. the abuse still haunts me, but all I have to do is to remember that feeling of being shielded from harm, and it makes it easier to deal with.

Frith,
TruGunny

[Tyr's Hand]

I've been waiting for the retelling of your path to Odinism. Awesome tale. It could be the beginning of the Bjarnason saga, that I will be telling my grandchildren about :D

[Sigurd]

Great story! :) It is always in those important moments of decision and so on that things manifest themselves in one. It did quite so with me:


I personally have only been a follower of Asatru for about a 3/4 year or so although at heart I have been for over a year, and it seems quite absurd. I had always been thoughtful, and interested also in the heritage of my ancestors. When I was 11, I wanted to know so much about my ancestors, that I tracked some parts of it down to 10 generations. I saw what they were, and I learned in history about the Germanic people. I was also reading the Nibelungs and books about Varus getting defeated all the time. This is when I started to be proud of what the Folk of my ancestors did before the coming of Christianity.
Yet I was still a half follower of the Christian belief. My family had been exclusively Christian for I don't know how many generations, so I decided that I would not change this.
But then there were these moments. I started to see: Where was "god" when they ganged up on me? Where was "God" when I was depressed and was looking for somewhere higher? Who was this evil bugger who never heard my prayers, "God" who was embraced by some of my family so firmly, and yet he never helped me. "God" had forsaken me, and I started to feel it.
Yet, I was pushed by my family into being confirmed when 14. It was the "proper" thing to do, and I thought like, "well, maybe 'god' will come back to me". He never did.
So I was walking the path line between Agnosticism and Atheism. But life was cheating me and I started to hate this world and everybody on it. THis was somewhen around middle-end of 2003. I was close to embracing the devil and let me show a higher path, because I was depressed. I wanted to receive, but after about two weeks or so I felt that the devil was not right to it. But I felt there was something "up there". But I did not care, I thought that I would never find it.
Then I was sitting on a hill with a friend, and life started to make sense again. I could hear birds singing, the sun was shining and the sky was fine. We lay there. Then was the time when he grabbed his book. I had forgotten to bring mine. Thoroughly forgotten to bring one. So I lay there and thought. And I felt that life was worth living. Everything made sense. I started to form ideas on my outlook on life, and the world. And I had this perception of a divinity. I felt the power, it was close to touch, and days and days again. I started giving my gods an abstract name, for I knew no names. And there was one who had a hammer, and I felt that he made the lightning. And there was one who had ravens circling him. But yet they stayed in my mind, I felt that everyone would declare me insane for making up my own pantheon.
And then it was October. My grandfather knew I loved my ancestry. He knew how I had devoured books about it. He knew also that I was interested in a mythological sense of things. So for my 16th birthday, he gave me this books entitled "Odin" and in it had poems about the gods. And when I was reading this, I realised that mainly how I had imagined my gods. Of course there were others that I had never seen. But yet when I finished this book, I knew that the one with the hammer was Thor, the hammer was a mjollnir, and that the Ravenlord was Odin. This is when I knew that all those months before that, I had been an Asatruar at heart. I had just not known what others knew. I never remembered the name of Odin felled anywhere. And the only Viking Metal I listened to last year was "Equilibrium" and I ever only listen to were two songs, "Met" and "Unter der Eiche". No mention of any gods (except Njord, but his name was not comprehensable in the text, and although I faintly grasped it, how should I have known it was a god). Of course I had always been interested in Vikings and other Germanic tribes, so I had drunk Mead before I ever knew about the gods (yea, i know, pretty pathetic :rolleyes: ). I was the unenlightened boy who drank the beverage his ancestors drank, and with pride. Those were the days where I gave more into my ancestry than anything else, for I had become a little right wing, and was almost a Fascist at some point. In September, I had composed my the world view which showed my hate for all I had experienced, and I used my belief in the "good old days" to promote this.
Then later I was a right wing Asatruar, and reading Vargsmal only supported this.
And then yet one day, I was left thinking. This was around March/April. I realised that I did not believe in "Mud Races", and that 99.8% of my ideals I still had, and that they were not right wing extreme. I realised, that I could still have national pride without being condescending to other ethnic groups. I realised, that honoring your own heritage does not mean that you have to disrespect others', for they have a reason to be proud of their heritage too, and all culture have a heritage that has to be preserved.
So, due to realising this, I became more open minded, and became what I classify myself as now. A Folkish Asatruar, with maybe a little national pride, but yet no feeling an "ism" on the end.
And yet my development is complete, I am almost where I want to be, and I have had my eye openers. And all these experiences not being there may never have led to my perception of the world.

[Sigurd]

Sorry for some odd sentence structure in above post, I forgot to proof-read it. But I think everything is clear, tho.

And sorry Hved for using your thread to write a basic outline of mine.

[Sigurd]

That is of course I had heard the names before, but never in the context they were. All I knew about them is how the days of the week were named after them, and all this other basic stuff. But nothing in depth.

[Skallagrim]

Hved, I reckon you should make this thread a sticky, where each member should write his/her own story about their calling to the faith. I would certainly like to write mine :p

[ensonulv]

Thanks for sharing Hved. This is'nt my story but funny. I kept on seeing two ravens EVERYWHERE i went, in a five block radious of my house. The last time was the day after I got back from the OR summer moot. (You are now entering the twilight zone.) :rolleyes:

[Loki's Advocate]

Crraak! Crraak! The master will be very pleased! Another one! :D

A saga of each of our lives; now that would be a good private undertaking!

[pinlighter]

Thanks for sharing Hved. This is'nt my story but funny. I kept on seeing two ravens EVERYWHERE i went, in a five block radious of my house. The last time was the day after I got back from the OR summer moot. (You are now entering the twilight zone.) :rolleyes:

Ha! We had a baby raven try to get in the house at an "Odinically significant" time.

It is probably just coincidence, but it made my hairs rise a bit.

[beowulf]

Ha. I had a couple of crows land in a giant oak and fly around the grove when I was once upon a time dedicating a horg to All-Father. I guess the crows would have to pass for ravens as there aren't any around here that I've ever knowingly seen :D . Could of been just notoriously nosy crows, but it was nice symbolism and timing anyway :)

As for how I came to be Tru, that's a much longer story. Readers Digest version: I first became interested in the lore, mythology etc. then realized that the gods still lived, and it just felt right to 'return home' to my ancestral roots. It seems the High Ones have answered prayers in the past and revealed themselves to me at times, esp. through the runes.

[Sigurd]

I feel a "sign" from the gods almost every day again. Last Wednesday, when I was hill climbing, I could almost not move my legs after half an hour (very steep, and I had my steeltoecap boots on), but I found the strength I never knew I had, and I believe that this was simply not me. I almost felt that Odin gave me the will to fight on, Thor the strength to fight on, and Tyr made sure that I would win my fight. I somehow almost felt that.
So I went on, and made it to the top, and thanked them for it. I devoted a moment to them when I stood on the hills windy top, with my arms spread out in freedom.
Well, not sure whether that has much to do with the actual topic of the "My Path to Odinism" theme, but it is moments like those that re-inforce that belief, and I thought that I would just share this, therefore.