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b"Remember, we welcome comments, questions, and suggested topics at thewonderpodcastQs@gmail.com.\\nS4E23 TRANSCRIPT:----more----\\n\\xa0\\nMark: Welcome back to The Wonder, science based paganism. I'm your host, Mark,\\nYucca: And I'm Yucca.\\nMark: and today we are talking about individual practice with shared values in paganism.\\nYucca: Yes. And it, we kind of danced around coming up with this topic because we started with the idea of talking about correspondence, which is something very, very common in many different pagan traditions. And immediately, Coming to, to the place of going, well, in Atheopaganism, there isn't really a shared, there's, we don't have a book, right, that says this color means this and this direction means that.\\nIt's kind of, it's kind of up to every person and that's a, a really common theme with how we do our ritual, how we practice, how the wheel of the year looks, all of those sorts of things. And yet, We still are a community that still practices with each other and relates and shares values. So that's where we were coming from with this topic.\\nMark: right, right. And I mean, a lot of us are solitary. A lot of us, you know, work on our own. And as you say, you know, we really encourage people to do this kind of DIY religion thing, right? Where you create the practices that work best for you. You create a wheel of the year cycle that reflects the natural world where you are and the climate where you are, you know, you create a focus that looks like.\\nThe way you want it to and has the symbols on it that you find meaningful. You do rituals. I mean, you may use the format that I put out in my book or not, but you create rituals that are meaningful and symbolic in the matters, in the, the ways that, that are important to you. It's not like. You know, some of the mainstream religions where you the the rituals are predefined.\\nThey're in a book. They're a thing that you're supposed to do. In some cases, you're not even allowed to do them. There's a priest class that has to do them for you. It's just it's not like that at all.\\xa0\\nSo, I was thinking about what kinds of topics we could do and so sometimes I will look to more mainstream pagan which is always an ironic term. Mainstream pagan books, right? And most of those books tends to be filled with magical correspondences like this herb means this particular thing.\\nThis, this gemstone or mineral is good for this particular magical practice. This you know, these things are associated with these zodiacal signs, you know.\\nYucca: directions,\\nMark: The four directions, all of that kind of stuff. And we don't have any of that because it really is. What does it mean to you? Right? So, in my new book that's coming out, for example, I suggest some colors and symbols that you can use for Celebrations of the Wheel of the Year holidays, but they're entirely optional.\\nAnd, and so I say, if the winter solstice is all about blue and white for you, then decorating blue and white, it doesn't have to be red and green. Like everybody else does do what works for you.\\xa0\\nYucca: Thinking about the directions because for some people the directions are really important I would imagine that if I live where you do, Mark, I might associate the West with water, but for somebody who lives in New York, they're not gonna, West is not the water, right? East is the water.\\nMark: That's right. If you live on the western shore of Lake Superior, then east is the water. There's no question about\\nYucca: Yeah.\\nAnd, you know, for a lot of, if you're in Tucson, snow might not be something that you really associate with winter solstice.\\nMark: no\\nprobably not. Yeah. Unless you, you know, go up into the mountains to go skiing or something, but\\nYucca: Right. Yeah. I mean, you go into the north, northern Arizona, that's a different matter, but, you know, not down in the low desert. So,\\nMark: So all of this is to say that that led us into the conversation about, well, Ours is a highly individualistic practice"