A guide to discernment: how to tell apart your own thoughts from deity communication
March 2024 (2549 words, 15 minutes)
In the time I’ve been in the Pagan community, one question has popped up more than any other — “How do I tell what’s a message from a deity versus what’s in my head?”
Many of us are called to build relationships with gods in a way that involves active communication. Be that prayer and answer, requests for guidance, a relationship of service and priesthood, or even oracular work, hearing and understanding the voices of our gods is a big part of many pagans’ practice.
Gods communicate with us in many ways: through divination, by the tarot cards and the pendulum movements they reveal. Through signs, by sending deer and ravens and lightning bolts at times and in ways that are profoundly meaningful to us. Through feelings and nudges, such as a feeling of “rightness” when giving an offering or feeling pushed or called to do something. And, occasionally, through ecstatic experience: intensely feeling them around us in nature, or meeting them in Otherworlds through meditation and journeying, or even inviting them within us in ritual possession.
It’s important to be able to tell: was it really them? was I imagining it? are they really telling me to do this thing? Being able to accurately identify and interpret our experiences is called discernment; it is a process and a skill that can only be developed through consistent practice.
Discernment is a huge topic and a lifelong journey, but I want to focus on some common situations:
- “I just left an offering for Aphrodite, and now I’m worried I did it wrong. I sense anger. Is she upset with me?”
- “I had a sudden thought in my head, claiming to be Odin. Are they really who they’re claiming to be? Is it an impostor? Or is it my own inner thoughts?”
- “I received a message from Hekate saying I should do something for her. I’m unsure, and I want to double-check.”
- “I had an intense meditation experience; I met the Morrigan and she told me something that was deeply meaningful and transformative. But now I’m doubting myself. Was it really her?”
These forms of communication are all direct. Unlike signs, or tarot cards, or candle flickering, these are all examples of communication where we connect with deity directly. We perceive them with our inner selves, through our thoughts or feelings or our mind’s eyes and ears (but not literal sight or sound). While direct communication can be extremely intense, discernment itself is a very grounded practice.
It’s important to be cautious about this type of communication if you’re experiencing schizophrenia, psychosis, paranoia, or any other mental health concern that interferes with your perception of reality. If you are plural, it significantly complicates matters. I’m not a doctor; consult a spiritually-informed and pagan-friendly mental health professional. Moving on, I’m gonna assume you don’t have any of these.
Direct communication has one thing in common: it is mediated through our own thoughts and experiences. How many times have you had a stray thought or feeling enter your mind? How many times have you had an imaginary conversation with a friend, or given yourself a pep talk? Given the extraordinary power of our minds to experience and to create, how can we know whether what we’re experiencing is ours or coming from the gods?
Techniques
These are remastered from my previous guide on discernment.
One note: Don’t overthink or derail your experiences in the moment. Let them happen. You have all the time in the world afterwards to reflect on them.
Second note: these are general patterns, not absolutes; think of them less as rules and more as ways to consider and contextualize your experience.
Considering context
When and where did the experience happen? While you were in a deep meditative or trance-like state? In the middle of a ritual? In a particularly weird area of the woods? While you were out and about?
Is the message you’re receiving related to the situation that you’re in, or what’s going on in your life in general?
Some places and times are more conducive to connecting with gods. I’m devoted to a Storm Goddess, and the energy of a storm makes it significantly easier for me to hear her voice.
Meditation and trance, rituals, journeying into the Otherworlds, being in spaces and times associated with that deity (forests, crossroads, moonlit sky), these are all states in which we can put ourselves to more loudly and clearly hear from our deities.
Just how a lightning strike can happen on a clear sky, so can deity communication be surprising and sudden. I’ve known people who’ve received deep insights during mundane activities (such as while driving, or during a short break at work), so don’t discount it just because it didn’t happen during a “special moment”.
Sometimes deities speak to us in dreams. But most of the time dreams are just dreams, and they happen if we think a lot about a subject, such as if we’re deeply devoted to someone. If it was a dream, did the texture and characteristics of the dream suddenly change? Was the moment of communication profoundly different from the rest of the dream? In what way?
Understanding your relationship with the message
Do you have certain hopes and fears? Are you particularly invested in hearing or not hearing something? Are you primed by recent or past experiences to expect something in particular? Were you surprised by what you heard or did it sound like exactly what you wanted to hear?
If the message is in answer to a question, how did you phrase the question? Was it loaded? Do you have an intense hope or expectation for a particular answer?
If it’s exactly what you wanted to hear (or what you most feared), it could be just your mind playing tricks on you. On the other hand, if a message is surprising, unexpected, or deeply insightful, perhaps there’s more to it.
Sometimes gods (especially ones like the Morrigan) hold up a mirror to ourselves. They cut through our self-denial and avoidance, down to the truths we don’t want to acknowledge. Are they telling you to do something that, deep down, you know you should be doing? Are they peeling back layers of denial and rationalization to reveal the core of a situation?
How do you relate to the message? What’s your reaction to what you heard? I was once in a meditation with the Storm Goddess I’m devoted to, and she said something that cut so intensely and deeply to the core of my being; she saw right through me better than I did myself. The content of the message isn’t relevant to this post. What matters is that it hit like a bolt of lightning, and I knew for sure it came from her.
Taking an emotional inventory
Take an emotional inventory of yourself. What were you feeling right before you had the experience: stressed, hungry, aroused, relaxed, guilty?
Particularly:
- Some emotional states make it very hard to discern. For example, if you’re really stressed, anxious, or needy, it’s hard to clearly hear the voice of your deity. Take a step back and respectfully ask to postpone communication for when you’re better able to receive it. A message can wait; prioritize self-care.
- Christian baggage (fear of punishment, “you’re going to hell” etc.) can seep into your relationships. If it’s a message related to hell, eternal punishment, damnation, or something like that, ignore it. It’s not your deity.
- Trauma can really affect your ability to discern properly. I’ve seen many Pagans who are sure they’ve angered the gods. When I go deeper into the source of those feelings, it turns out that they’ve had traumatic experiences in the past that have primed them to expect sudden angry outbursts or intensely domineering behavior. If it sounds just like the voice of your abuser, don’t overthink it: just ignore it.
- With intensely emotional and vulnerable work, emotions can run high and sometimes that manifests as sadness, guilt, and other paradoxical feelings. I would treat that as “my emotions are out of whack right now” and not something sent by a deity.
Negative feelings and messages from deities do occasionally occur, but they are pretty rare compared to instances of intrusive thoughts and internalized abuse.
It’s good to work with a trusted therapist through your traumas. Shadow work is also very useful. Deconstruct your latent christianity. The more resilience you build, the more you’ll be able to safely enter intense or ecstatic forms of communication, and the better your discernment will be. It’s a long and bumpy road, so be kind to yourself.
Knowing the gods
Spend time with your deities. Get to know them. Research and learn about them. Is what they’re saying in line with who they are? Does it make sense from a lore perspective? Does it align with others’ experiences of them? Did it “seem” like them?
Identifying the voice
If you’re feeling a “voice” communicating to you (again, not literal sound), how does it feel? Is there a sense of connection or presence? Does the voice carry a certain energy or feeling (maybe warm and calming, or perhaps intimidating and tempestuous)? What is the tone?
Does it feel like your own inner thoughts, or is it external? Where is the voice placed? Is it in your head, behind your head? Does the air feel different? Are you hyperaware? Are you in a meditative or trance-like state?
Is the voice easy to consciously control, or does it defy attempts to change what it says?
Journaling
Write down/journal your experiences so you can refer back to them later. In particular, make sure to separate the raw experience from your interpretation, so you can refer to either at a later date. Pick a few questions from the previous techniques that you find most useful and make it a habit to write down the answers.
Use your journal to cross-reference different messages at different times. Identify patterns and contradictions. Use them to improve your discernment in the future.
Confirming
If you’re unsure, you can ask for a more direct sign, or double-check with divination methods such as tarot or pendulums. You can ask for the same message on separate occasions. The more “out there” a request is, the more confirmation is warranted.
Sometimes we receive information that we couldn’t possibly have known about in advance. That’s happened to me and others I know, and it’s one of the more bulletproof ways to confirm a message. Don’t expect it to happen too often, but when it does, let it reinforce your connection, your trust, and your confidence.
Getting comfortable with not knowing
Do you need to be 100% sure to take meaningful action?
I once had an experience with the Morrigan where she told me something. I wasn’t sure, at all, whether it was actually a message or not. I had lots of doubts. When I went to confirm, the message I got was, in broad strokes, “I don’t care whether you’re sure or not, you better heed what I said.”
Oftentimes, you don’t need to know with 100% certainty in order to have a way forward. If the message is positive, encouraging you to do something you know is important for your growth and practice, or revealing a truth that you need to confront to better yourself, does it matter whether it came from a deity, or whether it was an insight you had on your own?
Maintaining boundaries
Know and keep your boundaries, especially if your relationship with your deities includes service or other work you’re signing yourself up for.
Have a moral and personal baseline you won’t cross. Things you won’t do if you feel like you’re being asked to. Check in with yourself. Does something feel off? Do you feel asked to put yourself down? Do you feel asked to do something unethical? Take a step back.
If the voice and message are causing you distress, making you feel less than, forcing you into a subservient role, or otherwise put you down and diminish you rather than help you grow, it’s likely trauma or intrusive thoughts. See above, Taking an emotional inventory.
- If an experience is causing you distress in the moment, stop and take care of yourself.
- If you can’t get away from distressing messages, take a break from deity communication and focus on working through your mental health. I wrote a while ago about connecting with deities after trauma.
Even if a message is 100% confirmed, you still have sovereignty over your life. You have the right to say no, or to revoke consent. It is ultimately your decision when and how to act on the information received.
The importance of honesty
All these techniques are useless if we aren’t honest with ourselves. I imagine that most people reading this, like myself, want to have an authentic and meaningful practice. That means being honest about when we’re receiving messages from our deities, and when we’re not.
How grounded is your practice?
Are you experiencing constant and continuous casual conversations with your deities as if it were an inner dialogue? If so, do you practice discernment? Or do you take every thought at face value and treat it as if it’s for sure your god?
The risks of an ungrounded, undiscerning practice go beyond not being honest with ourselves. We could lose touch with reality, and start acting on random thoughts and impulses. We are disempowering ourselves, because we’re treating unconfirmed messages as certain and definitive, taking away our agency in the relationship. When troubling thoughts come up, if we accept them undiscerningly as the voice of our gods, it’s easy to get into a spiral of negativity and mental crisis.
And, ironically, an ungrounded practice could drive us further away from our gods, by letting our own inner dialogue drown them out.
Some of us have the opposite problem though, and we have trouble trusting ourselves and the voice of our deities. We become paralyzed with doubt rather than moving forward with necessary action. Sometimes honesty means accepting that, yes, it’s real, and we have no excuses but to do the work.
It’s important to be honest about our experiences when we talk to other people, too. If we serve as priests to our deities, in whatever way that means to each of us, this is particularly important. We represent our deities and our practices, and others look to us as examples of how to interact and build relationships with the gods we serve. Oracular work is outside the scope of this post, but if we’re interpreting messages meant for someone else, discernment is 1000 times more important and getting it wrong is 1000 times worse.
Priest or no, if we are too quick to share on reddit what our deities told us, we don’t give ourselves time to grow and reflect. We’re too busy packaging our experiences for social media to allow them to deeply impact us. And it makes others, especially beginners, feel discouraged, by making them feel like their infrequent, vague, or uncertain interactions with deities are “less than”. It creates a culture where we share messages from deities glibly rather than thoughtfully. It muddies the waters if we share messages as factual without having done the discernment work first. It does us, our deities, and our fellow pagans no favors if we embellish our experiences or gloss over the challenging and uncertain parts of our practice.
Closing thoughts
Communicating with our gods, hearing back from them, and building a deep and intimate relationship with them is one of the most awe-inspiring parts of our practice. It’s important to be grounded and discerning, but not so grounded as to deny ourselves our own experiences. Discernment doesn’t just mean knowing when a message doesn’t come from a god, but also knowing when it does, and acting accordingly.
It’s a skill that’s trained with patience and repetition, and something we can infuse within our practice until it becomes second-nature.
Discernment gives my relationships even more depth and meaning. Without discernment, I wouldn’t have had a good way to process intense and transformative experiences. It is at the very core of my practice.