Introduction to Witchcraft

This is a serious of posts that I am going to be making about Witchcraft and a tutorial on it as a beginners guide.

Witchcraft is a broad term that covers a large and expansive set of practices. There are a few misconceptions about witchcraft that I would like to cover first. First, Witchcraft has nothing to do with the Christian versions of "satan" or the "devil". In fact in most cases Witchcraft and Christianity have no connections at all. The second most common misconception is that if you are a Witch you are automatically a "Wiccan" which is also not true at all. Wicca is a religion that follows a set of guidelines and religious beliefs. Witchcraft is a Spiritual practice. Witchcraft is about finding your own personal power and following whatever spiritual or religious believes that fit the best for you. What sets Witchcraft apart from other spiritual practices are as follows: 

• A Witch is someone who uses the power of Magick, the spirits, their own energy. They are guardians of power and work with the inherent abilities of all living beings on the planet. They direct and control the natural forces of energy and the Spirits to direct a certain intent.
• Witches believe in Magick (spelt with a 'k' to differentiate from stage show magicians). Magick is basically the existence of an underline current of energy that is present in all of life on our plane of reality and the ability to control that energy. It is an inherent ability of ALL witches to be able to use this 'energy' to direct will and create results
• Witches do not have to work with gods. However, if they do they choose the gods that they feel most comfortable or connected with. Since witchcraft is about that individuals spirit there are many witches that believe that they are their own creators of power and choose to affiliate themselves with no gods. 
• Witchcraft can require certain tools to represent certain energies. These are things like Candles, Ritual daggers called Athames, incenses, totems or statues representing a certain type of energy the witch wants to call on, staves, swords,  animal totems. The list of tools that a witch can use in their craft is completely up to that witch. If it feels right to them, they use it. This book will explain many of those tools.
• Witchcraft is NOT just for girls. The term Witch is for both male and females. Because a "Witch" is a completely different thing than a "Wizard", "Warlock", or "Druid". 
• For me, Witchcraft is about uncovering and using your personal power and intent to affect or create certain outcomes. 

Witchcraft is not simply defined by the things above, because it is a personal journey and the journey of each person will be entirely different. Witchcraft is truly about the person who practices it, and they will use it however they see is a benefit to themselves. Everyone has the inherent ability to be a witch, because being a witch is about being alive. Some are more open to it than others, and it comes much easier to certain people than others. It is true that there are people who are simply born witches, and by themselves have this ability unlocked already. But if ever someone wants to unlock their own personal power Witchcraft will come easily to them. It is not a craft to be trifled with, because out of all the crafts named previously, it is one of the most powerful. It can be used with helpful intent or darker intent depending on the wielder of the power.

Another thing about Witchcraft is that it is truly an ancient craft. It is as old as the awareness of ourselves. It is something to not fear, but also to not be taken lightly. Your power and how you use it defines you. Having power can be a good thing but also poisonous if you are not careful with the knowledge that is given to you. Being a Witch truly means that the ancient powers are with you, you walk in a world much older than you can even believe, and if that does not frighten you, then I bid you welcome and merry meet....

The Summer Solstice and Herne

          Wiccan practice says that for Litha the Oak King dies and the Holly King takes

up his crown. I am not Wiccan so I don’t really follow that tradition specifically but I do believe that the Summer Solstice has everything to do with the Lord of the Forest and King of Witches, my Patron deity Herne. The summer solstice is one of the Lesser Four Sabbats of the Witches Year. It marks the time when the sun is closest to the earth and enters the sign of Cancer. Aside from the astrological significances of Cancer the time of the Summer Solstice is a time for new beginnings not unlike the spring equinox.

         It is the time when Herne as the Lord of the Hunt is ripe with power and strength because he draws his power from the sun. The sheer energy of the Summer Solstice can be used to break through barriers in your life and burst in a ray of light through the darkness that you may find yourself in. Herne as King of the Witches offers to his children his power and strength and you may come to him during this time of the summer and pledge yourself to him. However, you have to remember that Herne is the representation of the Divine male. His energy is raw, powerful and very sexual. Often times his ritual’s either include sex or masturbation of some form. If you do a ritual for Herne you can definitely expect that you lower bits will definitely feel the tingle of his raw masculinity, whether men are your thing or not. The Herne consciousness is very sexually orientated but instead of using this energy for literal sexual act you can use it to *take* what you want.

         This energy of taking what you want and leaving no qualms is exactly what the Summer Solstice is all about. It was especially powerful for me this time. That energy was only amplified by the Solstice happening at the end of the Dark Moon as the New moon began. Mixing those two energies amplified the experience of both and I literally felt the whole world around me break down and change. I cried for several hours during that night.

         Unfortunately that night I was not able to do ritual. A friend of mine that I hadn’t seen in a long time came over for a visit and I was busy for most of the day and night with her and the rest of my group of friends most of which I hadn’t seen in a long while. Overall it wasn’t a bad way to spend the Solstice. However, the next night was my ritual night. Around midnight I dressed in my ritual garb, painted my blue crescent moon on my face, grabbed my Grimore, and headed out to the backyard. I am extremely lucky that my back yard is mostly private with a lot of trees and an open space for a fire pit and circle. That night I used the Dragons for my elemental guardians because I knew that I was going to need that extra power for everything I was feeling.
         I won’t go into extreme detail, but most of all my ritual involves songs and dancing. It’s how I raise and direct energy. I love to do both and the Pagan community has so many good songs that I use in almost all of my rituals. Very rarely do I ever use legitimate spells or invocations. I do use affirmations and sometimes spells if I am feeling extremely up to it. I called Herne and I gave him everything I had. I danced for him, I sang to him, and I offered him up my self. It was one of the truly most powerful nights of my life. Even though it was after the initial solstice.
         Even though, I did call on the goddess, I felt that in that night that I was the goddess. It was a really powerful experience that I know that I am truly blessed to have gone through. There is a tremendous amount of things going on in my life and before that night I wasn’t really sure if I could actually handle them. Herne reassured me that I could handle it and when the time was right he would deliver to me a Hunter of his to share in my life journey with. To be comforted by the sheer energy that was manifested is not something that every witch gets to feel during every ritual. Do I attribute this to solely the energy of the solstice and New moon? Not entirely.

         I am a firm believer that the divine exists within ourselves, and that we hold the power to make things happen and call on certain universal energies to help us in our time of need. This is what being a Witch is about to me. I have met the gods face to face and I know that they exist though I believe that it is within my own personal reality. The power to change your life is given to us as a divine birth rights. We are wholly apart of the gods, because it is the gods that created us. There are certain times when different energies are converging and amplify one another. Such as the Solstice and the New Moon opening up a powerful amount of new and fresh energy that we, as witches, can harness and direct. This was made such an emotional and powerful night for me because I was in a very emotional and powerful place. As Sully Erna writes “That which is like, unto itself is drawn”. I was so open and willing for something powerful and in such an open state I drew in this energy of Herne and brought it to reality.  

         The Summer Solstice may be one of the lesser Sabbats, but it can be as powerful as Beltane or Samhain if you open up yourself to the power that is Herne.

Blessed Be

Faewynn Lunaise Evenstar
)O(

Giving life to our Desires

            So, we decided last week what we wanted and who we were. We explored our personal power and what exactly that means for us individually. Let’s explore a little bit about how to take exactly to get what we want. Witches posses the inherent ability to control and manipulate energy. Our world and our individual realities are all made up of different energies. The quickest way to bring something we want into our life is to bring that energy or vibration into our lives. There are many ways a witch can draw upon certain vibrations. Using something called Correspondences or time tested things that all have similar vibrations to the intention. For example: Rose Quartz is a Stone that is a correspondence for Love because they resonate at the same frequency. You can use Rose quartz, pink candles, heart shaped totems, or anything that has the same imagery or power of love. This can all vary from witch to witch because sometimes different things have different meanings for some people. In example if you Love someone and that person gave you a gift or you have a picture of them you can use that also in whatever work you are doing for them.

         The other way is affirmations. Affirmations are a powerful tool for witches (or really anyone). Since we have the ability to command energy, an affirmation can be used to command certain energies into your life. They are used in all sorts of work. You can use one in Spell work; you can write a daily affirmation that you say everyday. The trick to affirmation is like I said to command the energy to do what you want. It is generally said in a authoritative voice and many people teach to say it in the present tense. If you are writing an affirmation for health you would say something like “I AM healthy!”, bringing the energy of healthy into your life to heal you. Bringing things into the NOW is a good technique for not just affirmations but in all aspects of your life. Focusing your energy and intent on the now helps us to create realities in which we want instead of lingering in a reality of the past or dreaming of something that may never happened. This can be a key point in working with the power of affirmations.
            Our next important part is not necessarily about bringing things into your life but rather gratitude. The universe is vast and wide, being connected to the energy of gratitude everyday is a positive life changing energy. If you are looking for a simple overall improvement in your spiritual life everyday practice Gratitude everyday. One of the first things my mentor taught me was to be grateful for what is already here in our life. Honor the spirit, honor our gifts, honor the divine, and if you can’t find anything to be grateful of then be grateful for the sole fact that you are. It is especially important to be grateful when even the smallest of steps are taken to get to what you want. That smile from the person you are trying to get the attention of romantically. That time they called you just to talk. Give thanks for anytime you feel an improvement in your health. For more complex things like being able to step on the break in time to avoid that car that ran the red light. All of these things are little gifts from the divine and when we accept these good things and give thanks by putting positive energy out we are more likely to attract positive energy towards us.
            These things can all be used together and often highly affect in a short period of time when combined and used everyday.