"Any resemblance is purely coincidental"

When I summed up spiritual practices around the world and through time that had animals as an integral part, I included therian otherkin but excluded daemonists. Therian otherkin may be unconventional, but didn't take a lot of explaining considering how common the practice and philosophy behind it really is. Daemonists took a springboard from fiction, warranting both a longer explanation and a shorter time and wider audience to dismiss daemonists as uselessly unconventional.

In 1995, Philip Pullman won a Carnegie Medal for his fiction novel Northern Lights, later re-titled The Golden Compass. The setting of that novel was in a world where every living human being was accompanied by a daemon: a corporeal animal with an empathic connection to the human. The world-building showed to be very well thought-out. Children's daemons could change into different animals, until they reached adulthood upon which time their daemons would settle into a single form of an exact species of animal. A person's "settled" form often said something about their personality. If two humans had a language barrier, then their daemons could communicate in some transcended daemon language, and through the empathic link from each daemon to its respective human, the barrier could be partially overcome.

I conjecture that this description of animal souls was heavily influenced by world history of spiritual practices that involved animals: the totem, nagual, fylgja, power animal, shadow animal. The word itself, "daemon", might have come from Greek metaphysics. Diotima of Mantinea mentored the famous Greek philosopher Socrates in a certain view of daemones, that they were a uniform medium by which prayers could be heard or answered by the Olympian gods. Socrates himself referred to it as a kind of conscience. In The Golden Compass, daemons occasionally argue with their humans, seemingly symbolic of instinct-versus-logic, or heart-versus-head: a conflict many nonfictional human beings are familiar with.

Pullman provided what is possibly the best springboard for the revival of animal-based spirituality. The differences that I noticed in traditional practices, had to do with personal versus social identification, dis-identification with the animal form versus integration... Looking back, I've formed the opinion that Philip Pullman's daemons really do portray the best facet of all those balances. In my opinion, this fictional portrayal is closer to the ideal workings of animal guides than most mythologies may have been.

Considering the discomfort the author had reportedly expressed before, in having The Golden Compass filed under the genre of fantasy instead of science fiction, I imagine that the details of his works being made into a spiritual practice would elicit a response somewhere between amusement and horror.

Still, a real-life daemonist community exists, without profit, blasphemy, or intent of copyright infringement. Many of its practitioners would even concede to it being a psychological practice, rather than a spiritual practice. The daemons are socially acceptable imaginary friends, "socially acceptable," that is within the society of daemonists. The daemon itself seems to be a dis-identified sub-personality of its human, but whether that's a nurturing and encouraging side, or a critical side, or some other part of the psyche that hasn't been isolated and defined... it's all individual.

At the time of this writing, it seems that no daemonist authority guides the masses towards what their daemon really should be, even though the community has agreed to certain distinctions on a "viable" form: basically, new daemonists are advised against coming in and saying that your daemon's settled form is a wolf because you are a loner by nature and so are wolves-- that misconception is a major peeve, no pun intended. (Okay, no pun achieved.) If a daemonist has too much difficulty at any stage, whether initially hearing the premise, or actively imagining their own daemon, or "settling"... then they don't have to join in that way or force it.

For many people, it's been helpful in their lives. Primarily, I think, it's for fun. And in a way where you don't have to know anything at all about Philip Pullman or his novels.

Not that I've ever managed to project a daemon, myself. Daemons may be "closer to the ideal workings of animal guides" as I said, but I have found some animal guide and... it isn't a daemon. At all.

I have, however, taken some daemonists' practices, and substituted another work of fiction in what I project.