Any New Agers I can connect with? I'm interested in New Ageism and would like to make some New Age friends who can get me in the right direction towards a life of New Ageism.
I'm not sure. I mean I'm new to the topic or idea. I know crystals and chakras is apart of it. From what I read recently, another belief is the Law of Attraction (which I find interesting and hopeful that it works because I need something like that in my life). I'm sure there's more to it but I'm still learning. I also read environmentalism is apart of it which I'm interested in too, and meditation and mysticism but I never understood how to meditate and I've never understood what mysticism is. And I think New Agers believes in natural remedies and home remedies which I'm also really into. And I'm not sure if it's a New Age thing but I like listening to binaural beats and other similar stuff for certain things (like pain relief, etc.).
To my way of seeing it, all of us who are getting old now, we are New Agers. If I compare my current life with that of my father at this same stage, the difference is enormous. We are the new old boys.
Yes, I know. Sorry, but I don't know anything about. That is the reason I just talk about it in its literal sense.
Hey, so I can try to give you a bit of background. I grew up New Age. As I'm sure you've gathered by now, the new age being referred to is the age of Aquarius. The general folklore about the difference between the age of Aquarius and the current or previous age of Pisces, is that it will be a time of compassion and understanding, rather than being focused on progress and dogma, which has been the focus for the past couple thousand years. It is generally thought that the transition is a gradual one which is currently playing out in a climactic fashion, and that's why there's so much turmoil in the world today. New Age draws heavy roots and terminology from prior heterodox movements in the 1800s, such as the spiritualist movement which involved Helen Blavatsky, pagan and wiccan revival movements, and Christian mysticism movements like that which Edgar Cayce was into. For context, in case you aren't familiar with the term heterodox, it is the functional opposite of the word orthodox, meaning that instead of being expected to believe one 'correct' version of something, you are encouraged to draw your beliefs from varied sources. New Age is heterodox at its core. It's entire historical context is based on the blending of New and old, western and Eastern, science and magic, that occurred as the modern era of globalism set in. Because of this tendency for diversity of thought, much of what is most strongly associated with New Age (crystals, herbs, energy work, astrology, etc.) Are synthesized or watered down practices inherited from much older medieval heterodox traditions, such as those under the umbrella of Hinduism, or the western occult traditions which were kept alive by hermeticists in Europe. As you could imagine, there is a lot of nuance here, and a lot of things I missed, but I hope this gives you a good idea of a religion which is sometimes hard to get a straight definition of! Happy to talk about it more if you want, too. I no longer identify as New Age, but I am well versed.
I've known some people who practiced it, though I don't practice. It seems to be a mix of Eastern religions and the mythical parts of judeo-christianity. They were a buncha older and younger hippies. The people i met did buddhist meditation, work with chakras, ley-lines, nature guides, crystals, angels, kaballah, reiki, and whatever divine powers they honored. They believe in growing and maturing both as people and spiritual beings, as well as taking care of nature, and the community. That's how I understood it anyway. It seems like a beautiful spiritual practice. They each seemed a little different in their approaches. Please feel free to correct me. I could be way off course.
I'm new to that kinda thing so I'm not knowledgeable about the topic enough to correct anyone about it. But thanks for sharing your experience/story. ❤️
Some of the early sources of the heterodox mishmash vaguely identified with new age seemed genuine. People looking into comparative religion or mysticism in the western world like Jung or some late. colonial developments in Hinduism towards a more unified thing (H is actually a conglomerate of micro religions often historically not very nice to each other) that transferred to the western world by the likes of Vivekananda. But everything I have seen in my lifetime (and I have been involved from childhood as my mother had an interest) seems to be just a conglomerate of cults and snake oil salesmen shticks creating a strange body of self-help-cum-conspiracies centred, vaguely spiritual and inconsistent ideas drowned in a sea of financial interests with little substance.
