“Like most sensitive souls, you already know you’re sensitive. You soak up others’ moods and desires like a sponge. You absorb sensation the way a paintbrush grasps each color it touches on a palette.”
Hi, friends. It’s been a bad week for me. I’ve lost work due to chronic health conditions and pain, and it’s been difficult to stay on top of bills and recovery. I’m recovering from severe anorexia nervosa and with funds at a limit as well as emotional energy, sometimes it’s hard to keep on my own two feet.
So I’m going to share something, an edible spell on my own creation, something I’ve shared with only one other person in my life. It’s helped me through multiple relapses and stressful times when eating and caring for myself has been difficult.
Please note: this does not replace professional medical care, be it physical or emotional. This is something I’ve added onto my weekly therapy and counseling sessions, as well as medication. This is not going to cure anything, but if done correctly, it can help sweeten your mood.
Here is the list of ingredients, as well as their beneficial properties.
Strawberries (6 large): Love, luck, and pleasure (also lust and pregnancy, but not for this spell)
Mint (3 medium leaves or 1 tablespoon dried) : Energy, communication, and vitality
Sugar (to taste): Where salt banishes, sugar invites. It invites sweetness and positivity. Does not apply to artificial sweeteners.
OR honey (to taste): Love, sweetness
Vanilla extract, to taste (not imitation): love, passion, and restoring lost energy (also lust, but not for this spell)
Sparkling moon water (to taste): just as it sounds, moon water made from sparkling water, preferably unflavored. Sparkling water has bubbles, which invited the element of air into you. Air can lighten, uplift, and be motivational.
The simplest way to make this recipe/spell is very easy. Whether using dry or fresh mint (it doesn’t really matter, just make sure it’s cleansed in your preferred method, as well as all your other ingredients and cup), smash it in the bottom of a microwavable mug. It should be as smooth as you can make it. You can even add a little sparkling moon water and blend it. Add your sugar (or honey) and microwave it in 30 second intervals until you have a mint strawberry syrup (or until the honey is completely incorporated). Let cool for a bit, then add your chilled sparkling moon water to your taste. It’s fresh, tasty, and infused with loving, caring magic.
If you’re a baker like myself, you cal also use these ingredients to make all kinds of wonderful goodies for yourself or others. Let me know if you’d like a Sweet Cream Bread Loaf, Sweet Cake, Macaron, or Ice Cream recipe with this magic.
Go on out friends, live as well as you can with the energy you have to spare <3
Black Salt is used for cursing, protection, banishing, cleansing, breaking spells or hexes, and repelling negative energy. Black salt is made by combining either activated charcoal or ashes from burned herbs or incense with sea salt.
Using activated charcoal will actually make your salt a dark black color, whereas using ashes will turn it into a lighter grey color.
Depending on what you plan to use black salt for, you can add different types of ash or other ingredients that correspond with your intent.
Ashes from various herbs and incenses for black salt:
Considering making an altar but don’t know where to start? This long-ass post should cover all the bases of altar building for those of you who are interested but stuck. This post is pretty vague on purpose, altars are an interesting grey area of this practice. When you build an altar you can’t really go wrong, it’s something for you to take control of and decide for yourself.
📖This is all taken from my grimoire so feel free to add any info of your own in a rb or in the comments.📖
🌻What is an altar?🌻
Altars are a magical work space for any witch/pagan/wiccan/other.
Historically altars and shrines were built all over the world in different cultures to house offerings and worship the gods/spirits/ancestors.
The difference between an altar and shrine can depend on the culture you’re looking at but generally an altar is both a work space and a place of worship and a shrine is solely a place of worship (the Theatron of Athens was an altar as it served as a place to house offerings and a communal performance space).
Modern day altars however are more private and unique to the practitioner/s. Altars and shrines can now be created using anything and include many different types.
There are many ways to think outside the box with altar building but don’t think you have to make one just because every other witch does.
🌻Types of altars🌻 (not an inclusive list)
- Home/family altar🏠: This serves as the energy centre of the home that is shared by the entire family. It can be simplistic, change with the seasons, and feature something representing each family member. (this is one that my dad built that lives in our kitchen).
- Personal altar: This altar is usually only connected to 1 or 2 people and kept separate from the rest of the family in a bedroom/box/draw. It can be put anywhere and be of any size (mine used to be on a shelf in my wardrobe and now it sits on the window) This altar is very personal to the practitioner often representing their passions and/or their patron. (this is my own to Dionysus and Apollo but it also includes my desk and bookshelf next to it since the window is so small).
- Working Altar: This altar is very practical. It’s only taken out when it’s needed for spells/rituals and is unique to the spell and it’s intention. If you want this type of altar then when you build it think carefully of what corresponds to the outcome you wish for.
- Shrine:(a form of altar to some, completely separate to other but I’m including it just in case). Created to honour a specific deity/creature/spirit. This is used to house offerings and pray.
-Travel/mini altar: Often stored away in a box/tin. Travel/mini altars can consist of small trinkets to carry around when you’re away from your larger altar or have to conceal your magic (it’s great for witches in the broom closet but depending on the size it could go missing).
- Image altar📷: Less traditional but very creative. An image altar could be a collection of images on Photoshop (for techies), a collage of pictures on a wall or board, or even a drawing of an altar (It’s personal, inconspicuous and it doesn’t matter if you can draw or not). I made this one in my sketchbook using pencil, ink and watercolour.
- Love/self care altar❤: This altar is fully dedicated to self care, loving yourself, or introspection. It includes things that have a lot of meaning to you and make you happy when you’re down (I have one by my bedside and use it when I feel shitty, I also use this space to contact my spirit guide).
🌻Supplies🌻 (again not an inclusive list)
These are some general supplies to have for an altar but this doesn’t mean that anything is 100% necessary.
- A flat surface: This can be anywhere with enough space to display everything.
- A cloth: Not just to protect the surface or fragile objects, it can be a sign of respect to your patron.
- Incense/oil diffuser: To smell nice and can be used to cleanse the space.
- Candles: Decoration, to represent fire or your patron, for candle magic, and meditation.
- Bowl/dish: To hold any offerings.
- Cup/chalice/bottles: For drink offerings, to represent water, to hold water for a spell.
- Matches/lighters: If you include candles.
- Crystals/stones: Decoration, could also be elemental/seasonal/represent the chakra.
- Wand/athame: Can be used to direct energy in a spell.
- Bell: To represent air, to call spirits/your patron.
- Mortar & Pestle: To grind up any ingredients in a spell.
🌻Building an Altar🌻
This is part is going to be a simple guide to building a personal altar (I will be using my own preference for deities as an example but you don’t have to).
1- Find a space: Think about where you want to work and consider the energy you get from different spaces (also consider any pets and fragile objects).
2- Find a surface: This can be as big as you like. I’ll be using my art desk as an example, I took everything off it and cleaned it before I did anything else.
3- Get a cloth: Fabric from a craft shop or an old scarf/veil are perfect and come in any available colour and size. In terms of colour you can chose one of your favourites, something seasonal or something to represent your patron.
4- Set your intention: Now this is the time to decide what your altar is going to be used for. You can pick a centre piece that reflects this.
I wanted to connect with the gods so I made the centre of the altar about myself and my deities go on either side. The centre piece I chose is a picture of a fairy scene I’ve had for a very long time.
5- Candles: The next thing to put down are candles (or any source of light). The light acts as the switch to turn on your altar and give light to any patron for when you want to communicate.
6- Tools: If you want to include any tools from the previous list then now is the time to chose where you want to put them (I included a cup of water, an incense holder, a bell, and a wand).
7- Decoration: Next is to add any personal decoration that can go wherever you like. I put mine in the centre piece.
8- (OPTIONAL) Representing patrons: This step is optional because it isn’t necessary to have a patron in your practice.
Because of the intention I decided on in step 4, I places the decoration representing my patrons on either side of my altar (btw these photos were before I switched from Aphrodite to Apollo so I apologies for the inconsistency).
I left a large space empty to use for when i’m writing in my grimoire, performing a spell or doing a tarot reading. I didn’t include this in my real altar because it’s a decorative section.
🌻Tips🌻
- There are templates that you can follow if you really want to. They’re usually for a large traditional elemental altar though (I personally don’t recommend them because it’s boring and not very creative).
- An altar can be as big or as small as you like and you have no rules or expectations and it doesn’t have to be just one surface.
- If you want an altar for a spirit/deity/fae as well as their respective candle, you could include a candle for yourself to represent your own spirit to stay connected with them.
- An altar is a very subjective thing, if it’s personal it should change with your interests (like from light and fire the first year to sea and sand the next year).
-There are hundreds of videos on altars here’s a few I recommend you look at:
There are several methods you can use to communicate with spirits, depending on your skills, preferences, and comfort level.
Signs and Synchronicity
The most organic way to receive messages from spirits is to wait for physical signs in your environment.
The concept of synchronicity was first introduced by Carl Jung. A synchronicity is a “meaningful coincidence” — a seemingly random event that feels meaningful to the individual. For example: crows have a lot of spiritual significance to me, and whenever I see or hear one it has a very specific meaning for me.
Another way a spirit might send you a sign is by surrounding you with physical reminders of them. I’ve most often experienced this with deities. If a new deity is reaching out to me, I’ll see images of them in places I wouldn’t expect to and may hear their name mentioned over and over again around me.
In her book The Angel Code, Chantel Lysette encourages readers to ask for physical signs when they connect with spirits, as a way to confirm that this is a genuine spiritual experience. This is something that has really stuck with me, and has become common practice in my spirit work. It can be very powerful to see signs in your mundane life that validate your spiritual experiences.
Divination
One easy way to communicate with spirits is to use your favorite divination method. (I’ve already done a whole post on divination, so I’m not going to spend much time on it here.) When using divination to communicate with a spirit, address your questions to them by name. From there, proceed as you normally would.
One thing to keep in mind when using divination to communicate with spirits is that the communication will be limited by the divination method you use. If you’re using a pendulum, you can only ask yes or no questions. If you’re using a tarot or oracle deck, the spirit will be limited to the cards in that deck when they’re trying to answer. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it is something to keep in mind.
Automatic Writing or Channeled Writing
This is a little bit different than other divination methods, because in this case you’re actually connecting directly with the spirit in order to write down messages from them. Automatic writing is the act of allowing your hand to write out a message without focusing on the words — the idea is that your hand will be guided by the spirits in order to write down their message for you. Some people believe that you should use your non-dominant hand for automatic writing, as this is your “receptive” hand. Channeled writing is the act of receiving a message through your psychic senses, which you then write down. Automatic writing is a type of channeling, but not all channeling is automatic writing.
I personally prefer channeled writing, simply because I find it more comfortable. Some witches prefer automatic writing because it bypasses your conscious mind, thus making it less likely that you’ll unknowingly “edit” the message. However, automatic writing can be a little bit harder to learn, so I’m going to focus on channeling here.
To channel a message from a spirit, you will need something to write with — a notebook and pen/pencil works, but so does a laptop with a word processor or even the notebook app on a smart phone. You will also need to enter a light trance state (this is the same state of consciousness experienced in meditation), so you might choose to use trance triggers like incense, shamanic drumming, or binaural beats. Begin by creating a protective space around yourself. (This is just to make sure only one spirit comes through at a time.) Invite the spirit you want to receive a message from into your space. Enter a trance and open yourself up to whatever it is they have to say. Don’t think about the words that come to you — simply write them down. You can analyze the message later, after your trance has ended.
Meditation
If you have a specific question you need an answer to, you can receive an answer to that question in a meditation. Likewise, if you want to connect with a certain spirit, you can do so through meditation.
This is fairly straightforward. Prepare for meditation in the way you normally do — light incense or candles and play music if you’d like, and make sure you have a comfortable place to sit or lay down. Before you begin to meditate, speak your intention out loud. This could be as simple as saying, “My intention for this meditation is to connect with [insert spirit’s name],” or “My intention for this meditation is to receive an answer from [insert spirit’s name] about [insert topic here],” or it could be an elaborate prayer.
From there, meditate as you normally would. Focus on the spirit you’re trying to connect with or, if you have a specific question, focus on that question. Whenever I do this, I often receive an answer in a sudden information download — suddenly the answer to my question is clear and obvious.
Pathworking
A pathworking is a specific type of meditation where you go on a psychic journey, usually with a specific goal in mind. I like to think of pathworking as the halfway point between meditation and astral travel. With pathworking, you are still anchored to your physical body, but your consciousness is able to make a journey into the astral world.
There are two important elements to a pathworking: a clear entrance/exit point and a way to retrace your steps. Pathworking journeys are typically cyclical — there is both a journey out and a return where you go back the way you came. This makes it easier to fully return your consciousness to your body, and failing to do so can cause you to feel disoriented upon the return.
A very common entrance/exit point is a door or gate which you use to enter and exit the astral realm. Sometimes it’s more of a home base — for example, my entry point is a rocky beach. I’ve also heard of people using a tree, or even The World Tree, as their entry point. Whatever imagery you choose, make sure you’re able to find your way back to it. If you’re worried about getting lost, author Thea Sabin recommends using “the Theseus trick.” Like in the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, you can tie a golden thread or rope to your entry point and the other end to your astral body. If you get lost, you can follow the thread back.
If you want to try pathworking, make a rough “road map” of your journey beforehand. This doesn’t have to be super specific, but it should contain the following: a goal for the pathworking (such as to connect with a certain spirit), an entry/exit point, and a general idea for the route you’re going to take.
Astral Travel/Spirit Flight
Perhaps the most direct route, astral travel (also called “spirit flight,” “soul flight,” or “hedge riding”) involves sending your spirit or consciousness into the astral realm/spirit world. Astral travel is not a beginner technique. This method should only be used by witches who have experience with meditation, pathworking, and other altered states of consciousness. The major advantage of astral travel is that you’re visiting the spirits on their own turf, which means you can communicate with them much more clearly and directly.
I’ll talk about both pathworking and astral travel at length in my next post. In the meantime, know that it is an option but that I only recommend it for intermediate to experienced witches, and even then only after some serious research into how to do it safely.
No matter which method you use, here are some basic rules to keep you safe and comfortable during your communication.
Cleanse before you begin. The best way to make sure you’re talking to the spirit you want is to clear out any other nasties before you begin. There are lots of ways to cleanse your space, from incense to sound baths to sweeping with a ritual broom. Use your favorite method to energetically tidy up before you try to contact anybody.
Use protection. A few safety precautions never hurt anyone, and they’re a good idea if you’re going to attempt one of the more involved methods of communication, like channeled writing or astral travel. The salt circle is an oldie but a goodie — once you’ve set it up, only spirits you invite can enter the circle. (But please don’t sprinkle salt on the ground outdoors — this hurts plant life! Use another protective substance, like rosemary, to form the circle instead.)
Know who you’re talking to. It may not be in your best interest to chat it up with whoever presents themselves. Not every spirit has good intentions. I speak from experience when I say that opening the lines of communication to whoever is around is not the best idea. Be clear and specific with which spirits you invite into your space, and don’t open the door to spirits who make you uncomfortable. This is part of the reason that having an established relationship with spirits that you know and trust is important.
Don’t take things at face value. Something that doesn’t get brought up enough in the New Age community is the fact that spirits can and do lie. They can also be wrong, and may give you false information in good faith. Just because a spirit tells you something doesn’t make it true. Always do your own fact-checking outside of spirit work.
Don’t be the idiot in a horror movie. Use common sense when working with spirits. Use safety precautions (see previous notes about cleansing and protection). Don’t intentionally contact negative entities — don’t be that guy who buys a Ouija board so he can talk to Jack the Ripper’s ghost. If a spirit gives you bad vibes, tell them politely but firmly to leave. When in doubt ask yourself, “Would a character in a horror movie do this?” If the answer is yes, don’t do it. You’re smarter than that.
Resources:
The Angel Code by Chantel Lysette
Wicca for Beginners by Thea Sabin
Southern Cunning: Folkloric Witchcraft in the American South by Aaron Oberon
New World Witchery podcast (several episodes, including “Episode 164 — Irish Folklore and Magic,” “Episode 161 — Practicing Safe Hex,” and “Episode 152 — Honoring Ancestors”)
“My Goddesses: How and Why I Work with Mary and Hel” by Kelly-Ann Maddox
