Welcome fellow travelers this is Jennifer and this is Julie and this is the
Omnist Trail Podcast where every path leads to the same mountain. We're not here
to tell you which path to take. We're here to walk a few of them with you. Today is
Waypoint one of the Omnist Trail Podcast titled What is an Omnist? Before we begin
here are a few disclaimers. We approach every belief with respect. We are not
experts, just curious explorers of ideas and our own humanity and personal
bias may show through it times. We do our best to say on topic. If anything we
discuss brings up strong feelings or touches a nerve that's okay. Take what's
useful and leave the rest. Please practice self-care and honor your own window
of tolerance. Step away or pause if something feels like too much. So in
beginning our Omnist Trail Podcast we are going to discuss how we found our paths.
So Jennifer what tradition, if any ,did you grow up in? Thank you Julie. I grew up
in a Christian church. My family attended ,my uncle was a pastor. We were in
church on Sundays right , Bible study, followed biblical teachings. Really just
was an infiltrated part of our our world and our lives. And you know not
neither good or bad. I think it brought a lot of good values to my life and and what
I learned and how to treat people and and such. But I think in terms of that
Christian belief system was just very very traditional. How about yourself?
Yeah I grew up similar I grew up in the Methodist Church and we went to Sunday
school and all of that and I attended youth group. It was a little bit more for me.
It established good values and the notion of helping out other people. We did a
lot of mission type work like local mission work was kind of cool or go over and
fix somebody's yard or whatever. And I got a lot out of the community of the
church I think more so than maybe the teachers. But I learned a lot and I went
into reading the Bible and all of those things I was very interactive with
material always I guess. So I was curious about why people believed what they
did and all of that from an early age. But yeah I grew up very open to lots of
different ideas. I didn't feel my church was counter to learning about other
religions and things like that. And we actually did visit other religious
centers as well when I was in church as a kid. So it was it was kind of a very
open way of learning about religion. So interesting because yeah then mine
was a lot more I would say closed it was very much this is the way you should
believe and follow and very based on those biblical teachings. But I know you
have a different path now. So was there a specific moment that really opened
things up for you? Was it a gradual process? Yeah for me it was both it's been
both. I've had leaps and starts and there was a lot of gradual coming to
appreciate lots of different ideas. I think I all I think I'm just I was born
with a more open personality anyway and just gravitated toward learning about
as much as I could because I didn't necessarily think that other people were
wrong. I guess I didn't I wasn't taught that really. Sure. And so I was maybe
I was maybe open to other things and then I as I grew up I had different
experiences with you could call it mysticism whatever I've had all sorts of
different experiences in life that kind of affected the way I perceive my
my belief system. How about you do you think there was something one specific
thing or I would say more gradual. I definitely got more curious after I try to
say like in my I was close to 20s meeting my husband meeting just other friends
and talking about more ideas and starting to research and learn especially a
lot more about the Celtic mythology and and faith and stuff because that just
always appealed to me and it was kind of like what does what does that mean though
and how like do I need to keep walking this Christian path or can I change and
explore more and over time I just kept exploring and kept exploring and kept
exploring question yeah yeah so it just I think just that constant like what is
and what's out there and learning and and over time just even the finding of
new connections with others and wondering even in some of that witchcraft
space of like oh you know you grow up hearing that's wrong that's like I'm
really curious about this I want to learn more about it and then learning about
the history of it all and all of that absolutely absolutely how you perceive it
yeah yeah I think to like in your life what has been this is what in your life
has changed as a result do you think oh I think I've just learned I've learned to
be a lot more open-minded and I see a lot of the connections from one path to
the next as our kind of our podcast is wanting to focus on that is not necessarily
there's a right or wrong but it's oh you know you have this belief I have this
belief and it's kind of the same thing so it's okay to feel the way I do and to
embrace my path and follow it yeah but yeah what about yourself anything that
change for you oh yeah I so for me I think the main difference for me in like
day-to-day life is that I was raised with a lot of prayer and kind of asking God
for anything and kind of using using prayer to navigate life and all of that and
now and opening it up to meditation I feel like I receive a lot of information
that way I feel like it directs my life in very different ways because I've for
me I embraced meditation first as as a daily ritual practice many years ago and
it was in response to the loss of one of my children so it was very effective for
me in healing and getting into a completely different headspace so it's been
vital I think and I don't know if I would be as healthy as I am today or as happy
as I am today without this practice so I'm really grateful that you know I I'm
really grateful that I was open to it and I'm really grateful that I have been
practicing for a long time and now have kind of it informs every day of my
life you mentioned kids because I know the way we connected was kind of through
our kids since they go to school together and it was so exciting to find that
connection between our our spiritual paths even though they're similarities and
there's differences right but from that we've had a great relationship of
building a coven with some other beautiful women which is not something I think
growing up right from that traditional Christian household that was not I would
say now yeah that was not part of Sunday school no not at all finding our
home at Aumana and incorporating the yogic aspects of life right and then just
being able to come together and chat about these variety of belief systems that I
think even expand beyond probably what we've ever thought they could yeah it's
fascinating it's just a beautiful world it is right and it brought us to
going we need to create this podcast and here so here we are creation of the
Omnist Trail podcast but with that what is what is an Omnist what is Omnism yeah
Omnism is well an Omnist is a person who I mean they know Omnist believes in
Omnism yeah an Omnism is it's kind of the belief either the belief in or the
appreciation for all the different religions so it's not necessarily that you
believe in every religion but you can take and pick and choose different
aspects of lots of different religions and appreciate and respect all the
religions because you don't necessarily see it as conflicting you can look at it
and see that it's human connection to the divine in so many different ways
and it makes it possible to then kind of have a more tailored approach to your
belief system as opposed to a package deal that comes with religion at the time
and I love and fellow travelers please look up our logo because our tagline of
every path leading to the same mountain kind of gives that Omnistic viewpoint we
have a rocky trail and a water path and a rickety potential rickety bridge right
you just never know which path you're gonna be on but all those different trails
with all their different switchbacks and blocks you know trees down in the road
kind of thing they all really do end up leading to that same mountain and we
can visualize that omnistic approach through that through that logo and through
that view of that mountain metaphor yeah and it I don't think it matters if
you're on what a religious path a spiritual philosophical you've got
traditions that we you know we grew up with in our homes and such there really is
elements of truth to all of them right and so many overlapping truths so what's
really interesting is when you compare different belief systems crop you know
through the world so many things repeat there are contradictions but there are
also contradictions within each religion so you it's it's just a fascinating
exploration when you can look at all of these ways I think people reach the
divine and the divine reaches people on the level they want like or on the
level that will serve them not not necessarily want but where it reaches you
culturally where it reaches you personally I think people find their way in the
way that makes sense no I agree and I know we've chatted about that right every
person is on that path that they need to currently be on finding the way that
they need to thrive and get through those challenges every day barriers all of
that which really this is a great lead in fellow travelers to our upcoming
episodes as our next episode will be talking about where some of those paths
converge overlap a bit and and then later on we get into episode three we're
gonna talk about where they diverge yes I'm fascinated by these topics so I'm
I'm as excited I think as you are yeah to dig into them I've been like I've
been learning about other religions I've realized for about 34 years well I
have been fascinated by the entire the entire phenomenon I guess so it's super fun
for me for sure and I really enjoy geeking out with you yes so fellow travelers
we would love to hear your questions your thoughts as well as topics you may be
interested in you can find us at Facebook The Omnist Trail podcast on Instagram
The Omnist Trail and feel free to just send us an email at podcast@theomnisttrail.com
so this is Jennifer and this is Julie thanking you for joining us on the path
today subscribe please tell a fellow traveler to tune in next time and we'll see you
again