Why Animism?

When I finally became a mother my concern for the destination of this fast-tracked world only grew.

What kind of a world do I want for my children?

The common thread many of the indigenous people I worked with seemed to have was a strong sense of belonging – to a people, a land, a heritage. It helped them feel more grounded in this frenetic world. How could I possibly equip my children with this sense of belonging?

As a busy mom, I felt frustrated because I needed these lofty ambitions to underscore everything I do, to fit seamlessly into our lives.

Don’t laugh. Although it seems like a tall order, all it took was a shift in perspective.

I realized the answer lies in having an aligned worldview because how we see the world molds our lives in its image. It informs our values & ultimately helps us make important decisions & take action.

When I pulled together all the things that I love: folklore, traditions, old-world skills, language, cultural heritage, earth-honoring practices I realized they held the remedy to demolishing the hierarchies & paradigms that keep us from recognizing our interdependence with all of life.

One word stood out: animism – the belief that everything is alive, sentient & lives with its own agency.

Children can show us another way

The final piece of the puzzle was unexpected, but obvious. I discovered my greatest teacher, my daughter. Neurodivergent, she came out of the womb railing against the status quo, making us question everything we thought we knew.

Over the last eight years, helping her navigate her inner & outer worlds, I realized that in another time, when we lived in communities & recognized differences as gifts, people would have seen her variants & channeled them into helping the community.

So, without the support of an intact, traditional community, how could I fill that role? How could we work together to excavate challenging behaviors & traits to work in her favor? Well, we would just have to turn them from straw to gold.

I started by honoring her most intense traits as Ancestral gifts lovingly honed over millennia to guide her to success in life. I trusted the process & unfolding lessons. Eventually I saw that Ancestral wisdom is not something we learn, it lives inside each of our cells.

Supporting, honoring & nurturing our children’s diverse mindsets will play an essential role in making transformative change in the world. The kids who don’t jive with modern structures & confines, the ones who struggle to conform are our greatest teachers for how we can live differently.

We are magic.

The wisdom of every one of your Ancestors who ever walked the Earth has been finely tuned across space and time & you embody it. Our bodies – flesh, blood, & bone house the love, wisdom & magic of our Ancestors.

We embody our Ancestor’s dreams.

We are the ones who can help build a better world, starting with creating a more aligned life for ourselves & our families. When we are aligned we are more empowered & have the resources to serve our families & communities.

Old Ways for Modern Families will help you unlock the skills, traditions & knowledge passed down from our Ancestors that are already woven into your DNA.

This sacred knowledge will help you enchant your modern life to live the life of magic & connectedness that you seek. You’ll begin to see that the simple daily acts & rituals you perform are the keys to creating the world you want to live in– what we do, small or big, ripples out to change the world around us.

This course will prove once & for all that the life of fantasy you long for is not escapism. Sometimes fairy tales, stories & art illustrate a lifestyle that is aligned with the world we want to live in, the life we need to create.

When you sign up for Old Ways for Modern Families, you’re getting more than information. You’re investing in a whole new way to relate to your children & the animate world, honoring their individual spirits + spiraling back to your innate wisdom at the same time.

Here’s everything you get when you sign up for Old Ways for Modern Families4 Pre-recorded Modules, released every 3 weeks starting June 17th

Each module comes with downloadable materials, which include:

• A workbook
• Resource Materials & Suggested Readings such as stories, myths & movies to share/discuss with your children
• Journal prompts to help you dive deeper into the work & how to incorporate it into your life
• Practical work, rituals & recipes to embody & utilize the material

Private forum to ask questions, but most importantly, build community with other caregivers on the same path.

There are so many courses on spirituality for women, but children are so often an aside. I appreciate the acknowledgment that many of us are care givers to youngsters, and that there are particular issues that go with that. I would recommend this course to another mother because it’s simply helpful for mothering folks who want to include children on their animist journey, and then it’s also profoundly helpful. The modules are springboards to deeper practices with our children, but each also stands on its own as a guide anyone benefit from, even if you are short on time or resources.

-Adriana Hoyle

I love your passion for these topics and the authenticity with which you deliver the content.
If they are interested in these topics I don’t think there’s anyone I’ve come across better than you to weave together these themes with family life/children, and bring them into daily life.

-Charlie Rigg

You provide concrete ways to approach topics that can feel nebulous and unapproachable. It’s hard to know where to start on this journey of providing a spiritual foundation for our kids that doesn’t follow the current cultural norms, but you provide incredibly helpful guideposts. Down-to-Earth. I appreciate that you invite us into your own journey of discovering this path and don’t present yourself as a guru who has unlocked the one and only way of doing things.

-Adrienne McDonnell

Some concrete benefits that past participants experienced as a result of taking Old Ways for Modern Families.

• “I’m thinking a lot more about what form our responsibility and stewardship should take. Instead of asking my daughter what a plant is, I ask her who it is.”
• “I have taken the first baby steps to connecting to my ancestors in a way that feels good to me.”
• “More confidence with what I’m already doing and to incorporate some new bits into our family life.”
• “Feeling less confused about how to include my children on my path when it feels so eclectic and exploratory.”
• “I feel more equipped with a vocabulary and a template after taking this course.”

I’m Jenn Campus. Author, anthropologist & mythologist. I’m also a busy mom of two young kids who I want to raise with the animistic worldview of my Ancestors.

As a Mythologist and Scribe of The Old Ones, I translate the unspoken words of the unseen world into stories that captivate our imagination & stir us to come into right relationship with the world & all its inhabitants.

As an Anthropologist, I distill those esoteric experiences down to their essence to create various practical frameworks to inspire you to create your own simple daily rituals & traditions that you can apply today to become re-enchanted with the world around you. These traditions can then be left as a legacy to the ones who come after us.

I’m a two-time best-selling author. I have a degree in Anthropology & Indigenous/Native American Studies from Hampshire College in Amherst, MA. As a Third Road Initiate & through self-study of the esoteric arts, I have decades worth of experience creating rituals & family traditions.