The face behind Sacred Sorcery

Hey everyone! My name is Bente and I'm from Northern Germany, more specifically from a small town at the border to Denmark and the baltic sea. I'm non-binary (all pronouns are okay) and pansexual.

I was raised pretty agnostic but very early on I was looking for something 'more' than the mundane. I dabbled in multiple religions including Christianity and Buddhism, started to meditate and even got a Tarot deck as a child. But nothing seemed to stick. After a series of traumatic events I became an atheist and very nihilistic. That time was a very sad and dull one for me. 

But then, during a time of low self-esteem, anxiety and depression I found out about Wicca through Harmony Nice's YouTube channel. I don't remember how I came about her videos but apparently the YouTube algorithm thought I would be into it - and it turned out that I was! Very quickly I found myself in a deep witchcraft and Wicca rabbit hole. I built my first altar space, bought a Tarot deck and started collecting crystals. During this beginning time my craft was very Solitary Eclectic Wicca heavy, influenced mainly by authors like Scott Cunningham. Back then this was what most new witches practiced. Wicca was everywhere, especially on social media, and the term was still used interchangeably to describe either the religion or simply witchcraft.

Very quickly though I found my love for everything Norse. I read books about pre Christian Scandinavia, the runes and Norse magick, but I still considered myself to be Wiccan. I didn't realize back then that my Ancestors and the Norse gods were calling. At some point though my sole interest in the Norse gods developed into a worship of the goddess Skaði. I felt very connected to her, especially during winter, and gave offerings to her when I went to the wintery forest. I thought nothing of it, just did whatever felt right to me. I've always been very driven by my intuition. 

Pretty quickly though my worship turned into a working relationship with the first deity: Óðinn. In hindsight, being a person with scandinavian ancestry and a deep love for learning and gaining wisdom who practices magick, it is no wonder that I ended up in a working relationship with him. At the point when my work with Óðinn became serious I also finally decided to adopt the label 'Norse Pagan' or 'heathen'. I personally like both. It's also thanks to Óðinn that I started my YouTube channel 'The Norse Witch'.

After I started working with Óðinn more gods and goddesses followed: Freyja, Hel, Thórr and Loki. I also delved more deeply into working with my Ancestors and it has since become a central part of my practice. My craft is now more and more influenced by my Ancestors traditions and beliefs. It's not the easiest road to go down because the part of Germany I'm from has for the longest time been Danish, so most of the folklore is more Danish than German and unfortunately I don't speak Danish (yet). But it is extremely fulfilling.