so I had this weird waking-dream thing last night

and it was about all these occultists all being high school students at the same school

Crowley was the king of hipsters and was always smoking cigarettes in the halls and making out with just about everybody to piss the teachers off.

Gardner was a really nerdy dude who had a bunch of really nerdy followers and they were always sneaking out on the football field late at night and accidentally burning circles into it.

Cochrane was the way too intense guy who stole all the frogs from the science lab and spoke gibberish at anybody who tried to stop him from doing anything. No one was his friend but there was a group of middle school girls who secretly worshipped him. He also tried to fight Gardner every morning before class, but it never actually happened.

Anton LaVey was the really wimpy dude who got picked on incessantly through Freshman year, then came back from summer with a tattoo and a shaved head and a college-age girlfriend and a band.

Edgar Allen Poe was even there, even though he’s from the wrong time period. He dressed up as Edward from Twilight but didn’t tell anyone that’s what he was doing. He would just smear body glitter all over his giant head everyday and glare at everyone. The guidance counselor thought he was trying to make some kind of gay pride statement and kept encouraging him to start a Gay-Straight Alliance chapter, but Poe would just make a dramatic face and run away without saying anything.

Austin Osman Spare was king of the art department but the school wouldn’t let him display his art in any of the school art shows because there were just too many titties.

And another thing…

templewitch:

Eros is not male… he is not female, he is neither and both and all others at once.

Eros is not all about the heterosexual or the homosexual… he is neither, and both, and everything else all at once.

Eros is all desire. All.

Sprung from nothing, stirring all that is with the burning urge to create. To move. To change. To mold. To destroy…. and repeat.

Because at his core he is nothing more than that burning urge. Nothing less. Everything else. All at once.

it’s Temple Day. We’re all busy with preparations for Belfire, which is next weekend - there’s only going to be about 150 people this year, so things are going to be a little scaled back. I’m going to lead a ritual as an alternative to the God and Goddess ceremonies that the event leaders perform. We’re going to invoke the Trickster archetype to be the third part and the alternative to the polarity of the gendered ceremonies. Specific spirits and gods are also going to be invoked, and the ritual will probably culminate in a noisy procession throughout the hills. The problem is that I’m so busy that I haven’t had time to sit down and make any planning decisions yet.

Witchcraft Survey II

asksecularwitch:

If you reblog this, please keep the title of Witchcraft Survey attached. This is not a Pagan-specific survey, and it can be insulting to people who are Pagans but who are not witches.

I don’t want anyone upset or made to feel that they are unwelcome because of reblogging error. -Thanks Secular Witch

Questions:

1. Do words have inherent power?
2. If you use language in your practice, do you rhyme anything?
3. Have you ever changed or altered someone else’s spell?
4. Have you had someone ask you to do a spell for you?
5. Do you let people know that you are a witch?
6. What is your favorite aspect of witchcraft?
7. Do you perform divination?
8. If you use candles, do you use beewax, soy, paraffin, or some other type of material based candles?
9. If you use candles, do you use ones you made, or ones that you bought?
10. Do you worship anything at all?
11. How are the five senses (Sight, Hearing, Touch, Taste, and Smelling) incorporated into your practices?
12. If you use representative symbols [colors, objects, sigils], what are your favorite?
13. Do you know at least one method to break a curse or hex?
14. Have you ever made a witches ladder?
15. Have you ever looked into a witchcraft tradition and decided that it wasn’t for you?
16. How do you feel about harvesting organs from animals?
17. What is your opinion on using wood in witchcraft?
18. Do you make anything in your witchcraft?
19. Have you ever created an egregore?
20. Name the first thing that comes to your mind when you think about the worst spell you’ve done [worst meaning any way you take it]?

1. Do words have inherent power? Yes, but it’s not necessarily a very strong or forceful power unless some extra effort is put in behind it. Saying the right words in the right tone at the right moment with the right mindset is more important than just the words themselves.

2. If you use language in your practice, do you rhyme anything? I’ve never been very comfortable with rhyme. Listening to rhyming poetry or ritual verse makes me cringe for some reason, unless there is a very strong sense of alliteration during the piece. I have some deep-seated aversion to it just like some people can’t stand the taste of cilantro.

3. Have you ever changed or altered someone else’s spell? I’ve never really been around anyone while they were doing magic that I wasn’t involved in, so messing around with the spell could have affected me too. I’ve done it accidentally though – the first witch that mentored me made a spell for a woman with a murdered brother and I accidentally threw it away when I found the jar on a shelf in the storage room in the shop. She put it there specifically so I wouldn’t throw it away, but in the end we agreed that the outcome that occurred depended the act of throwing it out.

4. Have you had someone ask you to do a spell for you? Yes, and only a few times did I do one. I’ve also been paid to do spells and done them for people who didn’t even know what I was doing.

5. Do you let people know that you are a witch? Sometimes. I usually let people know that I’m “weird” pretty quickly, so by the time I might mention a word like that they aren’t surprised.

6. What is your favorite aspect of witchcraft? Having an excuse not to ignore all the weird shit that happens to me.

7. Do you perform divination? Not as much as most people seem to, but on occasion. I usually use informal divination (yes/no coin flips, looking for signs or even Googlemancy) before I bust out the tarot cards.

8. If you use candles, do you use beewax, soy, paraffin, or some other type of material based candles? I use whatever candles I buy at the Dollar Tree, and cheap 4 inch Manischewitz tapers from the Jewish section of the grocery store. Only white – I use color for other things, but not candles.

9. If you use candles, do you use ones you made, or ones that you bought? I don’t have time to break out my hand-carved molds and I don’t have the money for local beeswax right now, so cheap store-bought candles are all I use right now.

10. Do you worship anything at all? I worship a lot of things, but nothing gets the blind, slavish and frothing devotion that the word “worship” tends to be associated with by some modern practitioners.

11. How are the five senses (Sight, Hearing, Touch, Taste, and Smelling) incorporated into your practices? My practices are nearly directly based on the five senses. I use colors and imagery to engage my sight, ritual soundtracks and bells to entertain my hearing, loops of thorny vines or silky fur to touch, lots of foods and drinks to taste and plenty of resins and herbs burning to smell. I enjoy sense-based correspondences more than anything. Using red linens and the scent of roses means more to me than performing work during the Hour of Venus or waiting for the correct moon phase.

12. If you use representative symbols [colors, objects, sigils], what are your favorite? Original symbolism my favorite. I like using the creations of myself or skilled artists for symbology rather than historical material. For example, I have a very modern interpertation of Kali in her shrine created by a talented artist on DeviantArt rather than something from a Hindu tapestry. Symbols need to be artistic for me to make an emotional connection with them. I also don’t do representative objects very well if they are shaped like something specific, but if I associate an idea with the object I’ll use it. I would rather have a white bowl of water than a decorative statue of the moon.

13. Do you know at least one method to break a curse or hex? I know a few methods to break hexes and I’ve done it a few times as well, but never for myself.

14. Have you ever made a witches ladder? Nope.

15. Have you ever looked into a witchcraft tradition and decided that it wasn’t for you? I’ve never looked into a witchcraft tradition and decided that it was for me. I pull bits and pieces from a lot of different cultures and traditions and make the rest up based on personal experience. I always try to pull basic techniques instead of cutting out things from whole cloth as well to avoid the problems with cultural appropriation. I might be inspired to make a spell that uses objects in a bag, but I won’t call it a hand or a crane bag and I won’t use the exact methods of construction either.

16. How do you feel about harvesting organs from animals? I’ve got a dried fox tongue that I’m going to carve a little wooden case for, and all the hearts and livers of the chickens we’re raising for meat aren’t going to be wasted.

17. What is your opinion on using wood in witchcraft? I use wood to heat my house and I understand enough basic Forestry (Part of my living comes from writing about it) that I have no problem using wood for anything. I know what a dead tree looks like and I know how to remove branches from live trees without damaging them.

18. Do you make anything in your witchcraft? There’s a lot of crafting going on. Physical components are a big part, and it’s hard to keep a spell going long-term without a jar or bag or box or piece of pottery that keeps it fixed.

19. Have you ever created an egregore? Not an egregore because I’m only one person and you need more than one to make a group entity. I’ve made a fair share of servitors (and still have quite a few of them), and I work with one egregore that is apparently shaking off the bonds of the group that formed her and becoming an independent entity.

20. Name the first thing that comes to your mind when you think about the worst spell you’ve done [worst meaning any way you take it]? An abscessed tooth and a bad case of strep throat at the same time. Not for me, for the person affected by the spell.