What it is to be a Priestess

 

A Priestess of Sekhat - St. George Hare

The word priestess carries much weight behind it. Being a priestess today is much different than it was a couple of thousand years ago. In the ancient world being a priestess meant that you lived your life in service to the deity you worshiped. Many times a priestess would reside at the temple and her sole purpose was to be of service to the deity and the temple. And this meant living with other priestesses and interacting with them on a daily basis. Their whole lives were dedicated to their deity and their spirituality.


Today as a modern priestess we don't live at temples and most of us can't devote our whole lives to our deity. We are career-minded usually working forty hours a week or more. We are mothers, grandmothers and wives. We are caretakers of our families and our households. We hold many responsibilities and wear many hats. And we try to carve out some time to honor our deities and immerse ourselves in our spirituality. Maybe a few hours at night a couple times a month on the different lunar phases. Or maybe just at seasonal festivals. We try to make the time to fit it in our already jam-packed schedules. But when we finally do fit it in we feel so much better and more connected. 

To be a priestess in today's world holds a much different meaning than it did in the ancient world. In this modern era as a priestess we are not only living our lives in service to our deities, but also to ourselves. In my opinion part of being a modern priestess is knowing yourself. To truly know your spirit is also akin to knowing your deity. To honor yourself is to honor your goddess. Whatever "honoring yourself" means to you. It could be taking time out of your day to connect with your creative side. It could mean pursuing your dreams. It could mean creating a family with the person you love. Whatever feeds your soul will also feed your relationship with your goddess. She wants us to be true to ourselves. For if we understand ourselves then we will better understand Her.

Now I'm not saying that the only job an ancient priestess had was to wake up and pray all day. They also held other responsibilities like healing, performing mid-wife duties, organizing temple celebrations, cleaning, cooking and many other such tasks. The difference is that all of that was in service to their deity and contributing to living a spiritual life. In our modern world we have to partake in things that sometimes take us away from our spiritual selves so we must learn how to create the proper balance. Today as a priestess we are not organizing temple festivals for the city. We are organizing family vacations or work-related presentations. 

One thing for me that has been invaluable on my personal priestess path is to have a journal. A place where I can write down my thoughts and clear up some head-space. A place where I also won't be judged for my thoughts or my writing skills. Keeping a journal is a great way to get to know yourself better. Some people will tell you that you must write in your journal everyday. For me personally once I start putting rules and restrictions on something, I tend to immediately rebel against it. Crazy I know. But that's how you find out what works for you. If you know that you aren't the type of person to write in a journal everyday or meditate everyday or do anything else everyday, that's ok. Then you do it every couple of days or whenever the mood strikes you. 

Part of being a priestess in today's world is finding a way of life that works best for you. We all serve a different purpose. And we are all created with different personalities. And by serving ourselves we are also serving our goddess. We make better priestesses when we are confident in who we are and what we stand for. And the only way to do that is to get to know yourself. 

So, what does it mean to be a priestess to you?