Trusting The Process
If there is one thing I have lots of trouble with when it comes to spirituality and working with entities, it's trusting the process. After all, how do you trust something (or someone) of which you are not even sure it's there? Apps like Tiktok are filled with videos about putting your trust into the universe and they almost always expect what they put forth to come true. A video on Tiktok isn't going to share the possible mental anguish with this line of thinking. At least, that's what I am assuming here. Most videos I have seen regarding this topic contain people who are very confident in what they are saying. This is by no means a flame post. If it works, why not? But personally, I have always had trouble to put this kind of trust in something as ambiguous as spirituality and (potential) spiritual allies. I just have never really been able to.
Mistakes Happen
Fast forward to last Sunday. After two years of COVID restrictions in The Netherlands, Elfia Haarzuilens was finally happening again! This version of Elfia has always been special to me because it was my first one and is always before, during, or after my birthday. This year I went together with my friends dressed up as pirates. And it was sure to be a long day because my boots were not made for walkin'. My favorite thing to do on festivals or renaissance fairs is to browse the stands and get either magick supplies or things that I happen to fancy. While we were browsing one of my friends told us about what he was looking for and asked in return if there was anything we were looking for. I replied to him that I was mostly looking out for stuff I could use in my workings with demons. He asked me who I tend to work with and for some godforsaken reason I could not remember one name while he was the most important one of all! It was on the tip of my tongue. "M.. M.." I snapped my fingers repeatedly until I called out his name. "King Mammon!" My friend smiled and told me he was probably disappointed I forgot about him, to which my other friend who was listening came over & told me I should probably get an offering.They were definitely not wrong. Luckily for me, I was already standing at a jewelry stand, so I browsed with King Mammon in mind. He has always been of the gold, gems & expensive jewelry. And as it happens, those are things I personally don't really care about. So, as you can imagine, my altar for him was pretty scanty. After browsing for a while I came across a pendant that gave me the idea he would like it. I didn't understand why, though. Because my first impression of it was that it looked kinda cheap. I informed one of the shopkeepers I wanted to buy it, but she had to check with the other one if it really was just 24 euros. Here is where King Mammon pulled a fast one on me. The man replied that it was not hanging in the right place. The pendant had real gold, real silver and a real amethyst. After a bit of back and forth it came down to that the pendant was 69 euros instead of 24. I decided to get it because I did owe King Mammon an apology offering. And giving him my most expensive alcohol was probably not gonna cut it this time.
Don't Freak Out
Spending 69 euros for one offering is not something I thought I would ever do. It is also something I don't really recommend to do on the regular. After assessing what the hell I threw my money at in the moment on the faire it turned out that I had, you guessed it, spent around 70 euros too much. Lately, I try to not care about money as much, so for once I decided to trust King Mammon enough that although I made a mistake, he wouldn't ask me to spend beyond my means. It wasn't easy, though. For a while I felt like Jake (on the cover of this post). I made a mistake and I had paid for it. Literally. However, all was not lost. Every April 27th in The Netherlands we celebrate the King's birthday. It's a big party, but we also go out and sell our stuff we don't need and/or want anymore. Looking how I might be moving in with my boyfriend soon, I had a lot to offer. I asked King Mammon for tips & tricks and hauled my stuff to a spot to sell. I didn't expect to get more than 20 euros at the end of the day because a lot things being sold on the free market tend to be less than 2 euros. But not only did I get enough for the necklace, I got 40 euros beyond the original goal.
Besides the money shenanigans, I learned a lot from standing on the market! Selling goods with only one hour of sleep is a bad idea. There are more people with weird interests in the town I live in. The motive of why you are selling stuff makes a difference. You can be more comfortable in social situations by engaging more social situations (to a certain degree). People will always try to haggle; including you. People will still talk to you even if you are wearing sunglasses for the harsh light, etc.
Trusting the process has worked this time around, but I don't know how many times more I would throw myself into the deep unless I have to. After all, unpredictability is not something I really enjoy. However, sometimes it's ok to put your trust into someone (or something), even if you doubt their existence.
This post was originally posted on April 28th, 2022