Category Archives: magick
Worksheet for the element: AIR
Below is a worksheet I frequently use for private students. This is a wonderful start to a Book of Shadows. The blanks, of course, are meant to be filled in by hand. Could you go down the list and just Google the answers? Sure.
Did your spiritual adviser/teacher have you fill out such things? What benefit could you see from doing worksheets like this?
Worksheet
AIR
Sample Calling: I stand and I face the _________ (direction) and call the element of _______. Bring with you __________________, ____________________ and ________________ to the edge of this circle for protection and purification. Welcome, _________.
Sample Dismissal: I return to face the _________ (direction) and dismiss the element of _____. Return now to your realm and come again when I call.
Direction:
Planet:
Color:
Role (what does it bring or contribute?):
Gender:
Tools:
Other Correspondence:
Symbols/Sigils:
Logically/Mundanely – what is this element to you?
Is it important in your mundane (physical) life? How?
Spiritually/Metaphysically – what is this element to you?
Why do we call this element?
Is it important in your magical/spiritual life? How?
List 3 things you hope to learn from this element.
1.
2.
3.
List 3 things you don’t understand about this element.
1.
2.
3.
After working with this element – list 5 things/lessons you learned from this element that made an impact on you.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Please use this page for any difficulties/discoveries you made during your Air quest. Any other notes/thoughts/experiences or anything noteworthy to YOU can be written here for discussion at another time.
Introductory Altar Building
One of the first things people rush to when discovering and beginning to follow a Pagan path is altars. They see pretty pictures on the internet and rush to assemble one. My advice? Wait.
As humans we are very attracted to the aesthetic of pretty things. Of course we are! Everyone wants things around them to be their idea of beautiful. Altars should be an exception.
When I get students who want to learn from me, the first thing I tell them is “If you have an altar, strip it.” When I was first seeking a teacher I was sooooo mad when I was told to do this. How dare they! There’s a reason, kids.
Removing everything that you’ve accumulated lets you go back to fundamentals. For those who’ve not yet discovered fundamentals it gives you a chance to really work on things first – before diving into the pool during adult swim. Please be respectful that this is a religion. You don’t just show up to a church and shout “I’m Catholic! Give me a shot of wine and a cracker!” It’s now how this works. It’s not how any of this works.
While there are many beginner books I adore, I sort of hate the whole self-initiation thing. I think in most cases people read a website, see a video, or read a few chapters of a book and go “Yep I’m 100% witch now.” or “I read most of that book … and I’m 200% Wiccan!” Please. Please?
Take some time to learn something from someone else. Even if all you learn is how to make some incense and a good bread recipe. Don’t assume you know everything and I think it’s a good idea to refrain from assembling an altar right out of the chute.
Here’s what’s most likely to happen. You dabble. You’re sort of into it so you buy stuff for aesthetics. No shame! We’ve all done it! You spend all this money on stuff for it to sit in part of a room that you don’t really touch. Now it is a source of contempt. All that money wasted on something that is meaningless to you. Just avoid that whole cycle!
I am not an authority to tell anyone how they should do things – but I have seen this cycle again and again. My position is to inform from the standpoint of experience only. Take that as you will!
Ritual Food
Eating something is very much part of my practice. Maybe I just haven’t mastered harnessing the universal powers yet – but after serious spell work or even a ritual I am wiped. I’m exhausted! Eating something has always been part of my magickal practice.
Lack of eating (fasting) has also been part of my practice. Let me tell you – as a fat girl – it is NOT easy to fast.
When to Feast:
Sabbats
As a yummy ‘thank you’ to your guides
When to Fast:
Asking the universe for a favor (gotta give something to get something)
Asking for anything that would be considered ‘above and beyond’
Show devotion
I eat something every day in my little sacred space. I offer the first bit of food to my Goddess, Hecate. When she has her offering and her candle is lit – then I eat.
Maybe this sounds crazy – but sometimes I even talk to her. Sometimes I talk out loud as if she were physically with me. There are times I communicate with her psychically. I would say most of my communication with her is ‘silent’. I anoint her feet with oil only used for her. I change her stones around (she has different stones at her feet at different times). I sprinkle some Hecate Water (rain water that has been charged under a dark moon) on her head.
I feast to say ‘thanks’ and I fast to say ‘please’.
All workings leave me tired. Many friends have told me that I should be tapping into the universe to channel my energy – but that doesn’t make sense to me. The energy of the universe is not my energy. I should use my energy and my intent in my workings to give it power. That’s my philosophy anyway.
Food as part of a ritual is really quite central to my practice. I always offer food to guests, too. I like to think that the positive energy of food radiates. If you eat something good or you eat something which replenishes you – then you will feel more positive and energized. I love to have a big glass of ice water and a big glass of ice cold wine during and after all my workings and rituals along with a fruit of some kind.
Path Searching
I have had lots of friend ask me:
How did you find your path?
Honestly? I just tried a bunch of stuff until something just felt right.
As a pre teen in the mid 90s I started out reading books about Wicca. I still own some of those books. There were things that resonated with me, but there were things which didn’t also.
A couple years later I looked into some Germanic and Heathen paths. Some of it sounded super cool. I was really interested in Norse mythology. However, it didn’t stick. The way things ‘went down’ just didn’t jive with me. No embodiment of the Lord and Lady spoke to me.
In the early 2000s I was introduced to a woman who simply called herself a wisewomyn. Sometimes she’d refer to herself as a hedgewitch. Now – this woman knew her shit. She knew every possible thing there was to know about herbs and dirt. How did she learn it? This is what she told me:
Well I looked up all the shit that was poisonous. I stayed away from everything toxic. Everything else I ate, drank, or used until I could determine its use. Then I wrote it down.
I said to her: They make books for that.
Her answer:
You think I’m going to let someone else tell me what works and what don’t?
To this DAY that is my advice to everyone. Don’t let someone tell you what works and what don’t. Try it. If it works or if it feels right – adopt it and shape it into something that is yours.
I understand that sometimes we have to be exposed to something new in order to try it to begin with – but don’t be afraid to try it. No one person is exactly right.
Here’s an idea:
Try casting your circle differently.
Typically it is: East-Air … South-Fire …. West-Water … North-Earth
Try it this way: East-Earth … South-Fire … West-Water .. North-Air
Why North as air?
Because the cold is blown in from the North every winter 🙂
Does anyone else do it this way? I’m sure someone does. I think each person needs to decide what element goes with what direction and what it means to them. I think each person should decide what everything means to them!
Is there something that you know you do differently? For example: I read tarot cards. However, I have never read a ‘how to’ book. I know that each card is supposed to have a meaning but I can’t for the LIFE of me tell you what each card means. Instead – I rely on my intuition and the order of the cards as they are pulled along with the pictures on the cards to tell me a story that I then relay to the person getting the reading 🙂
Does anyone else do this? Or do you do something similar? What things work for you that you don’t think would work for anyone else?
TotallyPagan 