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Candle Magic: The Shut the Heck Up Spell
Want a sneak peek at some of the material in my new book, the Candle Magic Journal & Handbook? Here’s one of my personal favorites, the Shut the Heck Up Spell – it’s one of many you’ll find inside! If you’ve got someone who can’t seem to keep their opinions of you out of their mouth—or who likes to gossip, tell lies, or spread information that isn’t their business—this spell is for you. To dress the candle, use a lightweight, unscented oil like grapeseed or safflower, and dried dill, which is associated with silence. Use a mortar and pestle or other grinding tool to crush the herb. Ingredients: A black candle…
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The Saga of Jason and the Speed Bump
I’m a big fan of using mundane stuff in spellwork, because there are always things around your house that you can finagle into a magical application. If you’re a parent, especially, I guarantee you that there are plenty of kids’ toys that are going to come in very useful at some point. To illustrate this, I’d like to share an epic tale from nigh on twenty years ago, when my twins (who are now college students) were toddlers, and we had a fairly impressive collection of Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars. At the time, I lived on a one-way street in a residential area, and because it was the connector…
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Protection Magic Basics
Protection magic is right up there with love magic and money magic, as far as Stuff People Ask About the Most. I thought I’d share with you a few of my favorite basic protection magic workings. Play around with them and see which works best for you! Witch Bottle or Witch Bag The idea behind this is to not only protect yourself but also send back the negative to who or whatever is being sent at you. To make a witch bottle, get a small glass jar with a lid. Fill it halfway with sharp rusty objects like nails or razor blades, pins, needles. When it is halfway full, there…
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Using Your Words – And Why They Matter
One of the things I always try to stress to people when they’re working magic is that words matter – and by this, I mean you’ve got to be REALLY specific. As an illustration, let me share with you a story from my own checkered magical history. I like to tell this story in some of my workshops, because it feels like it really drives the point home. Plus it’s a great example of how stupid I was when I was a n00b witch, and I like to remind people that while it’s great to learn from your own mistakes, it’s also helpful to learn from OTHER people’s mistakes. Teenage…
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Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall…
… who’s the most magical of them all? Well, YOU ARE, if you incorporate mirrors into your magical practice. From scrying to repelling spells to beauty rituals, mirrors can come in handy in a number of ways. Here are a few of my favorite magical uses for mirrors: Make a Scrying Mirror Scrying is one of the best known forms of divination, and can be done in a variety of ways. Basically, it’s the practice of looking into some sort of reflective surface — such as water, fire, glass, dark stones, etc. — to see what messages, symbols, or visions may appear. A scrying mirror is a simple black-backed mirror,…
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The Magic of Sigils
Sigils are a great way to identify your intent when you’re working magic. A sigil is simply a symbol of your purpose – for instance, you could use a heart to identify love, or a dollar sign to indicate money. Those are the easy ones – and certainly, there are a floppity-million other symbols you can use. If you want to do the standard issue symbols, pick up a copy of Raymond Buckland’s Signs, Symbols, and Omens – it’s chock full of great suggestions. That being said, one way to connect your intent to your working even more effectively is to create a unique symbol of your own. This sort…
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The 9 Herbs Charm
About a thousand years or so ago, some clever soul sat down and wrote, in Old English and Latin, a collection of folk medicine, charms, and prayers. Later named the Lacnunga by a nineteenth-century editor, this text included what has come to be known as the Nine Herbs Charm. In addition to referencing Woden himself, the Nine Herbs Charm lists—wait for it—nine different medicinal herbs, which translate into the modern mugwort, betony (although some scholars say it’s cockspur), nettle, plantain, thyme, fennel, crabapple, lamb’s cress (or watercress), and chamomile (mayweed). Ben Slade over at Heorot has a great translation of the text, so I won’t rehash it here, but suffice…
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Coffee Magic
This is a simple spell that you can use to change your own fortune – and let’s face it, we’ve all had some runs of bad luck, where it seemed like nothing would ever get better. It does, eventually, but using a bit of magic is a great way to move the process forward. You’ll need a cup of unused coffee grounds, a clean washcloth, and a green ribbon, because green is associated with luck. Put the coffee grounds inside the washcloth and tie it up in a bundle, securing it with the ribbon so the grounds don’t come out. Go take a shower, and use your handy dandy coffee…
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Break a Curse With Stabby Things
In general, most of us go our entire lives without encountering anyone who has the skill set or level of motivation required to hex or curse us. In fact, if things are going badly for you, the odds are good that you’re NOT cursed or hexed, but simply (1) having a run of bad luck or (2) making really shitty life choices. However, it’s always POSSIBLE that bad things in your life are a result of some sort of magical attack. Before you go assuming this is the case, though, ask yourself a few questions: Did you seriously piss someone off in some way? If so, does that person have…
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Can You Even Magic? Not if You’re Lazy
I periodically (and by periodically I mean A LOT OF TIMES) get emails and Facebook messages from people who lead in with What A Powerful Witch they are, and then by the second paragraph they’re begging me for spells. This weird juxtaposition tells me a couple of things. First, it means they’re not as Oh So Powerful as they think they are, and more importantly that they actually think Powerful is something that can be measured, when really what matters more than Powerful is Effective. I’d much rather be effective – and I am – than so-called powerful, which is all relative anyway. The second thing it tells me is…
