To ask if you believe in witchcraft?

[superstarheartbreaker]

My exes mum was known as a " White Witch". In other words she was very into woo and practiced as a Chrystal healer, could sense energy, was psychic and was into all the new age bull shit. Vegan etc , etc.

I think a large amount of this is bullshit however there are a few incidents which made me think. One involved her son. He was v abusive and when we split up I felt very low. At the time she was thousands of miles away in the USA. She phoned me up in ters ( she had no idea we gad split up) and told me she knew how low I felt and tha I should hang on in there ( I felt suicidal) she said she could feel my pain. Wierd as last time we met I fine.

I don't agree with the way she raised my ex ( brought him weed for his bday etc) and a lot of what she believed in ( and how she enforced those beliefs) was questionable but I do think there was something a bit strange about her. ( my dad who is the straightest man on the planet even thought she'd put some kind of spell on me at one point -- although that was probably due more to her abusive son.)

My own feeling is that Wicca has some power but that any attempt to manipulate nature to ones own ends is not to be trusted.

Am I barmy???!!!

[AboutAWeekAgo]

I feel a bit awkward writing this down, so please don't poke fun or laugh, worraliberty in Islam, we believe there are another type of powerful being, called Jinns. They are like humans but can take different forms. Some humans can harness the Jinn and make them do jobs for them that a human couldn't do.

I know it sounds unbelievable and bonkers, but I've seen/experienced things. Heard stories from people about inexplicable things that have happened to them. This is before I even believed in anything remotely woo.

[mwalimu]

I meant the hairy note/shower scenario dora

[DoraGora]

Correct, mw. I surmised that no one that I knew owned hair like that. Therefore it was an invitation for a stranger to meet my partner in the shower. My partner said that it was for a nephew (whose hair didn't fit that description either) therefore it was a lie. I hadn't been there. I didn't know what had gone on. But, I was pretty sure that I was being fed a bunch of lies. I'd call that instinct.

[BertieBotts]

I used to read a teenage magazine which had a "woo section", they had a right good magic spell for spots. You had to take a tube of witch hazel cream, yeah, imagine a glowing green light around it for three days and then use it on your spot and the spot would magically disappear! Just like that!



I lean towards the woo but I don't believe in magic.

[mwalimu]

I'm totally lost dora why would someone invite someone to their shower by sticking their hair to a note ?

And, why would someone invite their nephew into their shower???

I know I is missing something, but I cant work out what?

[DoraGora]

It wasn't my partner's hair on the note. The hair was unknown to me. Quite why the stranger added their hair to the note I will never know. I think the reason that my partner (now my ex, obviously) started making up these ridiculous lies, was because they didn't expect to get asked specific questions about this note and that hair. And, in response, started making stupid stuff up.

[AboutAWeekAgo]

Hair is often a tool used in blackmagic. I used to walk by tufts of black hair on the road outside by house, on my way back they wouldn't be there.

I guess you have to have a really open mind about these things. You wouldn't believe if it's never happened to you. It's not something that happens in western culture. It's rife in the Indian subcontinent. I wish there was a documentary about this.

[WorraLiberty]

AboutAWeekAgo

I wouldn't poke fun or laugh, but what I will say is this...

I was raised as a Catholic. I haven't been to church since my parents told me I was old enough to choose (aged 12). It certainly wasn't for me.

I don't believe in religion at all, yet I couldn't utter the words "Jesus is a cunt" without an awful feeling in my chest (I have it now, just typing that).

It makes no sense to get a horrible feeling when uttering something about someone I don't believe exists....but that's the power of religion in my upbringing. To an extent, it still has a hold over me.

I am in no way superstitious either, yet I get a funny feeling when I walk under a ladder...due to the superstitions of the otherwise reasonably intelligent family members who were instrumental in my upbringing.

So I can quite understand why you might believe in these 'Jinns', because if the intelligent people who were instrumental in your upbringing believed in them, of course you would follow suit...especially if you believe in Allah and all of that sort of thing.

However, it doesn't make it any less woo or any more believable.

If I brought my children up to believe black was white, and my child's teachers, doctors, loved and respected aunts, uncles, grandparents believed the same thing...well of course they're going to believe that too and struggle with the concept of anyone telling them otherwise.

[swarley]

The hairy note has me so confused

[GothMummy]

I dont see why Wicca is regarded as any less valid a religion than Christianity or any other religion. They all sound a bit bonkers when you look at them objectively.
I suspect they are all different names for, and different ways of, contacting the same divine.

[BertieBotts]

Another example of non-woo power of human mind kind of thing.

When I was eight we started to go swimming with the school. The swimming pool was next door to the school building and we had to walk around the two boundaries to get there. My best friend and I, to pass the time on the walk, invented a game whereby you had to stand on every manhole cover you passed to build up your "power". The only exception was if the pattern on the manhole cover was squares. It was very, very bad luck to stand on one with squares and it would make you lose all of your power.

We never used the power in any game or kept track, but from then on I've always felt wary of manhole covers with squares, and still avoid standing on them, even though I know we made it up and it never meant anything anyway! I even feel a little bit anxious when faced with a manhole cover with square diamonds, or a raised grid (leaving inverted squares) because I don't know whether they count as good or bad.

[Muddlewitch]

Me too swarley

Was the partner having an affair and made up a story about the nephew to cover it? Was anyone in the shower? I'm so confused.

[WorraLiberty]

Exactly Bertie

The mind is the most powerful thing any human being has...and yet it's the most vulnerable thing when it comes to what it gets filled with at a young age, and by who.

Whatever superstitions/religions/atheism you grow up with, is purely down to circumstance and the power and influence of your elders/loved ones.

[Idontseeanysontarans]

Hair is used as it's a part of a person - some people believe that it creates a bond between the person and whatever the hair is used for - eg a binding spell. If you come across a witch bottle or poppet it will probably have hair in it. Urine or toe/fingernails as well usually.
Deliberately missing the point of the thread because I cba to get into the whole witchcraft/pagan/Wicca thing but for the record - it's a wide ranging belief system and not everyone is a total charlatan

[Darkandstormynight]

Police Departments very commonly call psychics to find murdered people and they are also right many times. I had a friend whose 13 year daughter was murdered. The police called a psychic after months of trying to find her. The psychic took them right to her grave, and also described who murdered her (her 17 year old boyfriend). She also turned out to be right about that.

As skeptical as I am about these things, I tend to believe that at least that psychic knew what she was talking about.

As far as Wicca or really any religion I think it is dependent on if You believe in it to 'work'. If you believe half heartedly I don't think really anything 'works'. Years ago I dabbled in Wicca because I was in a very bad place emotionally and thought it would be a quick fix. I'm so glad what I was doing ultimately made me uncomfortable and I gave it up. Now I wouldn't even have books about that stuff in our house. As soon as I got better emotionally the first thing I did was give all that stuff away.

I also believe most psychics Are hooey but that there are the rare few that do have insights most people don't.

[PomCuter]

Don't know. I do know someone who fully believes they are a witch, & earns their living partly from this. A more self-centred & short-sighted person, I never met. They claim to be able to see auras etc. I call bullcrap on this - either that or they are a really horrible person.

I'm not discounting the possibility of woo/witchcraft - I just remain to be convinced.

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

I believe its all suggestive/power of the mind etc...but that itself is not to be underestimated.

The quoted PP said she 'thinks' she believes this - but I believe it absolutely. There are loads of mysterious phenomena in our universe and on our planet, but none of them are woo/psychic/paranormal.

I used to live in a country which follows a dual religion - christianity and voodoo. I saw some incredible feats practised by voodoo 'priests', some of them so amazing that I spent 18 months researching the predictable natural events that made them possible. The things these practitioners did, taking advantage of the natural events, were fantastically clever and brilliantly executed, but they were not woo. At one gathering, I was possessed by a voodoo spirit. It was the outcome of hours of alcohol-fuelled dancing, on a very hot night, to powerful drum beats: delirium, basically, and it was fun. But it wasn't woo.

I also had some other voodoo experiences that were most likely drug-induced. It's quite easy to alter someone's mental state, either chemically or behaviourally. If the subject's willing to believe in woo explanations, they won't accept that their mind's been manipulated. It's a pity, because this makes them vulnerable to exploitation.

[mwalimu]

I knnow about hair in bush magic. But I don't get doras story, am a bit intrigued

[TooSensitive]

I don't believe in religion at all, yet I couldn't utter the words "Jesus is a cunt" without an awful feeling in my chest (I have it now, just typing that).

But worra, didn't Jesus really exist and as such the above statement (which I can't re-write as I too was brought up as a Catholic (and stopped going to church when I was 16) ) would be about a historical figure who may or may not have had that type of personality? (Rather than about a fictitious character - though granted, whether Jesus was the son of God and whether God exists and in what form are open to debate! There is also very little consensus about what the historical Jesus did in his life see link.)

Feel I may be missing point of thread and you

[CheerfulYank]

I believe in the possibility of almost everything.

[TooSensitive]

Oops meant to say:

Feel I may be missing point of thread but whole issue of whether or not Jesus existed is interesting.

Not sure if I believe in other stuff but would rather not dabble in case it comes back to bite me!

I agree that humans are suggestible and that the power of the mind is great. Also that some people are more intuitive / perceptive than others.

[Alisvolatpropiis]

Goth

I don't think Wicca is less valid than any other religion, I think it is about as unlikely to be real as any other.

[Mrsstarlord]

I also don't get the shower story

[daisychain01]

People can ascribe all sorts of meanings and connections to things and call it a name "witchcraft" "psychic" or whatever they like, but it's all random stuff and if you don't believe in it, well nothing terrible is going to happen, is it?

What I really object to is people exploiting those who are at a vulnerable time in their life, taking money off someone under the pretence of being able to speak to their deceased husband/wife. That's mean and cynical.

For me at least, it has never been on my radar and I avoid those psychic fairs because I just can't take them seriously.

[daisychain01]

I'm like you Worra, having been brought up in the Catholic religion, even though I don't go to church regularly, there are things I just can't do (like what you said ), it would trouble me a lot despite me questioning many of the concepts that I was taught by the nuns in my school.

Maybe I intellectualise everything, and religion is a blend of intellect and belief.