Any witches here?

[speakout]

Or Wiccans. or Pagans?

I was raised as a witch- my grandmother was born in 1890 and taught me how to scry, knotwork, many magical activities. She was a dresser of the dead and a lay midwife ( before the NHS).
I now practice my craft with enthusiasm.
A little tricky as my extended family are not supportive.

Those candles sound lovely!

Morning ladies.
I have been reading this thread with interest. I am very interested in all that you have discussed and did a bit of reading many moons ago but the Jim Cunningham book put me off a bit too then life kind of got in the way of 'me'.

I would love a look on your website Speakout if you can pm me details please?

I have no witchy/cunning folk heritage, my mum was very spiritual in her own way and very open to alternative paths but didnt practice any prescribed 'way' and I would love to learn more about witchcraft. I live near the sea and like sitting just watching the waves, we also have woodlands nearby and we love a walk through the woods, hedge rows brambling, picking elderflowers to make cordial etc. (I also live in Scotland Speak) but I dont think I have any particular talents/affinities in any areas as yet.
I have been looking at you tube videos over last few days (not sleeping late at night) but very few are really helpful (any pointers would be great)

TBH I am very interested in getting rid of all the negative energy in my life caused mainly by work. Having worked alone for years I was looking forward to getting back into a 'team' but the experience has been a shock to the system! So much backbiting and bitchyness I was shocked, and so much putting each other down, my confidence was rock bottom within 2 weeks. I am slowly building myself up again and I keep telling myself I am just as good as they are etc but some days I dread it. I was very interested in your spells for protection and binding to see if they could help. There is a lot going on in my life just now, we are being forced to move out our home and are in limbo till something comes up. Part of me is devastated/terrified and another part is excited to start a new chapter. I plan to make my new home full of nature and light and make it a fresh start for me and my kids. I want a clean happy positive spin on my life after the last few years but sometimes its just hard when you are on your own to stay positive.

Sorry for the essay, hope you dont mind me joining in.

As my mum used to say "Love and blessings to all".

Hello all, hope you don't mind another random joining :)

Talk of altars upthread, here is my work in progress...

I'd like to build a little alter but wouldn't know where to start?

I would like a little alter too!

I'm planning to make some more cleaning products today. Hopefully take 2 will be more successful for me. This time I have some Castile soap, will this work with water and essential oils? Happy to take advice before I get going.

@speakout I also would be interested in your website if you would like to PM me

Oo as would I like a link, I meant to say

Altars can be really simple - from just a collection of things that have meaning to you to really elaborate ones with human and animal skulls and the full ritual paraphernalia.

I keep finding I create them by accident! This is one new one (it's a shrine really) to my Autumn Lord. Once I had him the other items just gravitated to his windowsill. He gets weekly offerings from me of milk and honey (sometimes cream if I want a favour!) It's not a great picture - he doesn't like to be photographed.

The second picture is actually a full working altar for an open ritual a few years back

Speakout what a lovely candle spell. Candle spells are my wheelhouse, so to speak. I make candles for friends and family for various purposes, I started finding old pretty/interesting glasses at charity shops and pouring directly into into those. They make such beautiful and individual little candles.

Most of the candle spells I do for myself are done with colored chime candles, little things so that they will burn out completely in an hour or so. I have a tiny little "pokey" tool that I stole from my kit of spot extraction tools that I use to inscribe them. I too love sigils. Sometimes I use my own, sometimes I use ones i've found online or on pinterest that speak to me.

I'm almost entirely solitary, but to some degree I do wish for community. I've got plans to celebrate the full moon with a witchy coworker and our daughters, and I know she'll be looking to me to lead things as I was raised witchy and she wasn't. I'm nervous and anxious. I feel stupid saying my spells or incantations out loud. I rarely do even when I'm alone. Gah.

I started with all of the stones, pinecones, acorns and shells DS2 has given me
Well, not all of them or it would be literally full!

(He's a proper little magpie for natural stuff...)

DoubleNegativePanda thank you- your candles sound lovely too- such a nice idea to but pretty containers from charity shops to make them in

BeyondRadicalisationPortal

That sounds adorable- how thoughtful your son is to bring you all that treasure.
These gifts are the most meaningful and important ones!

What is a sigil? Sounds intriguing!

Good morning everyone!

What a very lovely thread! I actually started from the very first page. All the contributions have been really insightful.

I’m not very witchy at all. Like you @Speakout, my family are all very born again. But since I started on an alternative path of spirituality, I found that these subjects interest me a lot. They always have actually.

I have a very dear highly advanced witchy friend who has taught me about angels, ancestral worship, meditation, mantras, the elements and lots more. Getting into daily meditation has seemed to be the very hardest. Due to my abrahamic religius upbringing, fear has been something I have also had to deal with. The first time I tried pendulum dowsing my hands were trembling. I never tried again although after going through this thread I really want to try again.

Light and love to all of you! Have a lovely day

Good morning lotus
Due to my abrahamic religius upbringing, fear has been something I have also had to deal with

I am so sorry that you have been brought up to feel this fear, it's a hard wiring thing and can be a challenge to overcome.
One of my nieces was brought up Baptist, is now atheist but struggles with the hard wiring side of things.

I would say read as much as you can. Pagan/Wicca/alternative path is not to do with evil.

Wishing you much light and love in your path.

And to all my new witchy friends.

I am having a quiet day, have my salt purification ritual as soon as I get up ( overslept a little today) and take some photographs later.

Thanks a lot for the advice and kind wishes speakout.

Quiet day here too, reading in bed atm

Can I ask for some witchy advice/help?

I have a close family member who is just relentlessly negative about everything. This is going to sound unkind, but I find being around them draining. It's like this person radiates negativity and it is making me feel anxious, panicky and often angry. I'm not an angry person, you may have seen a thread I started the other day about how lost my temper with another driver who'd tailgated me. This is so out of character for me, and I didn't recognise myself in the process. I also opened myself up to making the situation even worse.

My very woo Auntie told me a while back that she thinks I'm an empath. I'm also an introvert and therefore it doesn't take much for me to absorb the energy of others.

For various reasons it's not possible to cut this person off. I think they are probably very depressed and unhappy. But for my own mental wellbeing I need to protect myself. Ive tried white light protection but am not sure it's doing very much at the moment. Ive not tried spell casting in years, and am not sure id be confident doing so yet.

@lightonthewater very basically a sigil is a drawing/symbol that you create with intent and then power or activate. I am a complete novice so I did a little google and read a few articles.

The one I did the other day I wrote down what I wanted it to do, then removed all vowels and duplicated letters and then I used what I had left to draw a symbol. Then I meditated upon it to charge it with energy and pinned it to my front door.

It felt very intuitve to me, but I want to study sigils more as I feel this is something I have a natural affinity for.
I am currently working on one to chalk on my doorstep to protect our house, I am hoping to draw and activate it with tomorrow's moon.

@ManicUnicorn I am an empath and I have to be careful to shield myself against people with powerful energy - good and bad! I have a family member like that too and I am well practiced now at shielding myself from their energy. I have no real tips I'm afraid as it's a skill that has just evolved over time.

Can anyone recommend a spell for bringing happiness and harmony to a new home? Also to help a family member find a job they enjoy.. quickly!!

queenrollo, thank you. I am fascinated by this, and will try it!

Good evening all,

Good to have more witchy people join us

Interested in your salt purification ritual speakout would love to hear more about it.

With regards to deflecting negative energy/others emotions. This is something I'm constantly working on too. Different things have worked for me at different times, but here's a few things I have/do use:

• Daily visualisation of cleansing and protecting my energy field. I
imagine a kind of 'cosmic hoover' (!) removing any unwanted energy, and then seal a protective barrier by imagining a golden light entering me through the top of my head, filling my body, coming out of the soles of my feet and connecting with the centre of the earth (grounding me) then coming back up through the earth and sealing a protective golden barrier which will let in positive energy and deflect negative.

• I'll bathe in Epsom salts with citrus oils (for cleansing), light a green candle and visualise negative energies being removed, 'seeing' them drain down the plug when I've finished.

• I'll sometimes take an 'oak bath' for strength and protection- with oak leaves, essential oils that feel right at the time (I like frankincense, sandalwood and ylang ylang but it's very personal)

• For protection throughout the day I like to carry a symbol of strength, e.g. An acorn, a key for security etc.

•I also like deflection symbolism. I love mirrors for this. They can be placed inside your front door facing out, on your desk at work or wherever you feel vulnerable to negative energies. I've even known to place a small, outward facing mirror inside my bra if I know I'll be spending time with someone who's energy I struggle with! The idea is to deflect the energy back to the sender rather than absorbing it.

Probably one of the most important things I've done wrt absorbing others' energy is learnt to question wether what I'm feeling is mine or someone else's. Over time this has really helped me discern and release. I'm better when I'm looking after myself, taking time for self care.

Around the home, I like to use salt for cleansing- if I want to absorb unwanted energy, I'll place salt water in the four corners of the house/room leave it to absorb, then return it to the earth with thanks.
I also use smudge sticks to clear energy and burn palo santo wood to fill the space with positivity.

I love the witchy idea of sweeping a new home with a new broom and symbols of bees for a harmonious home along with oak/acorns (midsummer baby here!) for strength and protection. I like it that I can work these into my home in a subtle way, just for me to know about

Loving the idea of sigils, I need to do some research!

This thread is fascinating. I was brought up in a very fundamentalist religion which taught that anything like this is evil and of the Devil. Consequently I have always been very wary of anything that seems to be about personal power over others, working with dark arts etc. Surely, if most witches are 'white' witches, you would be horrified by those who are working for the 'other side' as it were?
At the same time, I am very drawn to spells, rituals, working with energy and nature. In particular i have always been very fascinated by those ancient healers who used herbs and remedies.
I am a reiki healer, and have noticed that I seem to have an ability to pick up on people's thoughts and energies. Synchronicity is something that seems to happen a lot when I am particularly tuned in in some way. For a while I became quite frightened by something that was happening increasingly. I started to feel the energy of animals very intensely, so that i felt i KNEW what it felt like to be that animal. I kind of switched it off as it scared me.

I've found out that my great aunt was psychic. She did automatic writing, foresaw events before they happened, and was also a water diviner.

Tarot and I do not seem to work all that well together, and I find dowsing useless as I get the wrong answers all the time!
I would love to learn more about scrying and working with crystals in particular, as well as casting spells and working with nature. Like others, woods have always had a particular fascination for me . I love the moon and stars, and nighttime .
I would love to know where to start working with magic, but feel wary of covens and am terrified of the 'dark side'.

@SciFiFan2015 I think things and then they come true or see people who look like people and then I see the real one and also I get a lot of intuition ... is this witchy ?

Hi lightonthewater and welcome.

I think many craft workers don't see themselves in the dualistic black /white good/bad paradigm.

It is a christian perspective. God and the devil, good and evil.

We don't see other people this way, most of us are shades of grey, for most our actions are neither wholly good or wholly evil.
Some are of course, we have great acts of kindness and heroism, some people do very destructive things.
But most of us I think bumble along in a lightish shade of grey.

And while we use our everyday actions, words and abilities to make our life happen, witchcraft is merely an extension of that- like having longer legs of better math skills.

How we use those abilities is no different to the way we use our everyday abilities.

The " dark "side has a deep and fascinating history, tied in with fertility, dirt, fecundity, white supremacy, feminism.

Satan is an invention of the church - christianity would be nothing without a bogeyman.

Is witchcraft all about "energy " if it is ok really interested in this because I feel I have a relationship with "energy "