Latest Posts by witchshkt - Page 9

2 Card Tarot Ideas

Do / Don't 

Life / Death

Problem / Solution

Now / Later

Logical / Emotional

Yes / No

Internal / External 

Past / Future

Growth / Stagnation

Love / Hate

Apathy / Empathy

Find / Lose

Flaws / Strengths

Day / Night

Physical / Abstract

Stay / Leave 

Creation / Destruction 

Give / Take

50 Tips for Tarot Novices and Masters Alike!

Always make sure your deck is shuffled and cleansed.

There is no one way to shuffle, find what works for you.

Cards that fall out when you’re shuffling may hold extra important meaning.

Learning from books is good, but use your own intuition as well. 

Thank your deck after a reading.

Be sure to charge your cards and be nice to them.

Using a cheat sheet or a book is not a bad thing.

Biddytarot is great for learning basic card meanings.

If you don’t have a tarot deck, you can use regular cards or make your own.

Tarot and Oracle are NOT the same thing.

There are a few tarot apps to help you learn (golden threat, galaxy, etc)

Watch for multiple cards from one suit.

Pay attention when a card follows you through multiple readings, it is usually trying to tell you something.

Find the card that matches with your birth-date/you feel a significant connection to. Use it in personal readings to help strengthen them.

Always be sure you’re using a deck that works for you!

Pay attention to the symbolism and art of the cards.

Interview spreads are great for getting to know a new or old deck.

Divination is not specifically witchcraft and is not always tied to it.

Don’t let anyone but you touch your cards unless doing a reading and you want them to touch them- messes with energy.

If someone besides you does touch them, make sure to cleanse.

Decks have different personalities, don’t be bummed if one doesn’t work out for you.

Be prepared for a deck to get sarcastic and give out riddles.

Keep a journal/notebook/google doc of different spreads. You can even organise them by type. 

Daily draws are great, but don’t knock yourself if you can’t do them every day.

Meditating before a reading can help gain clarity. 

An easy way to cleanse your deck is to put them all in order then shuffle them again. 

Flash cards are good to memorise meanings.

Bonding with your deck can help readings be more accurate. An easy way to do this is sleep with them under your pillow.

Cleansing/charging your deck can be as easy as leaving them in a windowsill, or as intricate as a ritual.

You can have as many or as few decks as you want. 

Making your own cards does NOT make you less of a diviner.

Readings are not set in stone, take them with a grain of salt.

Reversals are not always bad.

Upright is not always good.

The death card does not mean death. 

Keep a journal to record your readings.

Try to remember one keyword/idea for each card to help you learn.

Make sure your deck fits in your hands comfortably.

If you’re just starting out, use simpler spreads. 

Past/present/future is great for beginners.

Amethyst is a good stone to have around.

But, letting your deck choose it’s favourite crystal is also important.

Using a tarot cloth can help keep unwanted energy off of your deck, especially if divining in a public place. 

Tarot bags are easy to make, just find a drawstring bag tutorial and edit the measurements to fit your deck. 

Playing music while doing readings can help you focus. 

It’s okay to redo a reading if you don’t feel it’s right, but keep the first one in mind. 

If you practice witchcraft, you can use tarot in various spells. 

You don’t have to read reversals!

If tarot doesn’t work out for you but you still want to use divination, try other forms such as oracle, scrying, pendulums, cartomancy, and more. 

Practice!!!

Witchy Youtubers

Here’s a list of some of my favorite witchy/spiritual youtubers that I can’t get enough of. This is by no means a complete list, feel free to add onto it!

Anais Alexandre

Annie Tarasova

Ashera Star Goddess

Avalon Cameron

Azura DragonFeather

Broom Closet Artistry

Creosote Coyote

Dewdrop Dwelling

Ember HoneyRaven

Ethony

Harmony Nice

Hibiscus Moon

Jessi Huntenburg

Joanna DeVoe

Joey Morris

Kelly-Ann Maddox

Laura Daligan

Molly Roberts - HerSpeak

new age hipster

Oolong Witch

Orriculum

Owlvine Green

Samantha Valens

Scarlet Ravenswood

Snow Orchid

Sunshine MorningRae

The Sea Priestess 

The White Witch Parlour

The Ladygravedancer

WitchandMoon

WyllowWynd The Thrifty Witch

May the moon light your path.

🔔 BELLS IN WITCHCRAFT 🔔

Bells might just be the earliest form of superstitious practise that I remember. My baba attached three sakura-patterned suzu bells on my schoolbag as a kid, purportedly for good luck and protection from evil spirits – and Japan is far from the only place to have associated bells and bellringing with mystic practise. They’ve been used worldwide to ward off evil and carry messages – and in a more metaphysical sense, sound is the movement of energy through substance. Sounds have the potential to work powerful magic.

Here are some of the ways I’ve found utilising bells to be helpful to my craft. While I’m more likely to use traditional suzu type bells, your own background, path and culture will likely have its own types of bells – and as ever, bells can be ornate antiques or they can be a bottle cap in a tin can, as long as they’re used with intent.

GETTING STARTED

🔔 As with so much of the craft, if you’re new to the witching bell, it’s a matter of exploration and experimentation. Get a “feel” for what works for you and the specific bell you’re using.

🔔 It’s good practise to ensure that the bell itself is cleansed, warded and protected – you don’t want anything nasty tapping into that power. All witching tools can do as much harm as good, intentional or accidental.

🔔 A good way to begin incorporating bells into your craft is infuse them into any typical ritual that you’re comfortable with, or even just a prayer or moment of contemplation at your altar if you have one.

🔔 Give the bell a soft ring while focusing on the energy it’ll ripple and move, try to track the movements it creates and what it touches. The tone it’s sending out.  The most primal and versatile use of the bell – and what many of the below come down to – is simply another manner of physically channelling energy, giving it shape and direction.

PROTECTION

🔔 “Passive” bells such as windchimes or small bells attached to belongings you don’t want disturbed are a starting point. They will scare off some forms of spirit all by themselves, especially if appropriately blessed, charmed or enchanted. Or cursed.

🔔 Gently tolling can draw energy into a ward or circle you are forming and enforce its protective properties, or for a simple cleanse, letting the sound travel to every corner of the area you are protecting. It’s a little more “cutting” than a smoke or incense cleansing, which I view as more “gentle” forms of cleansing. Both have their uses.

🔔 Harder tolling is, in my opinion, one of the most powerful ways in which to enforce a banishing – however, it’s best to you know what you’re doing with the bell before you go bashing it about.

DISCERNMENT

🔔 Bells can have quite the effect on your perception and awareness. Ringing and then stopping, listening to the silence left in its wake, can bring you new perceptions or make things you’d previously missed obvious. Let it attune your mind and senses to something new, whether that’s in your thoughts or something with a little more presence. Visualise travelling with the sound, taking heed of the energies it touches and disturbs. Take note of the echoes – you’ll learn what they mean with experience.

🔔 A set of windchimes can let you know if something is passing through or if there’s some unusual energy afoot – and, yes, it may also just be letting you know that it’s a particularly breezy day, but that’s witchcraft for you.

CONJURING

🔔 This can be as simple as calling good energies to witching tools, spell jars, tarot decks, crystals, altars and shrines, your favourite teddy bar, anything at all.

🔔 With spirit work, it can truly help to magnify your “calling”. This can range from gently bringing your latest offering to the attention of your friendly neighbourhood house spirit – all the way to trying to catch the attention of something more. Be mindful, however. As I said, I consider bells pretty powerful tools and a call that’s too loud is not good spirit work practise for the spirit worker’s own sake. It can really help coax something out of hiding if you’re gentle with it, though.

COMMUNING

🔔 Some use bells to mark the beginning and end of a ritual, and I’ve read that in Wiccan practise an altar bell can be used to invoke the Goddess, although as a non-Wiccan, I’ll welcome corrections on that if I’m wrong.

🔔 In my experience, very simple forms of communication via bell work a lot better than anything too complex – “come here” and “stay away” have already been covered, and other than that they can serve as greetings or signals of a start or end of some practise or ritual, the opening or closing of a door, etc.

🔔 They can also serve as a warning or a litmus test regarding spirits, a signalling of your presence and awareness, lack of fear, or willingness to defend – but be prepared to deal with whatever responses these garner.

BINDING

🔔 Bindings are where you most often see that famous (clockwise) circular motion of the bell, embodying the meaning of the spell. This can be a simple binding to seal a spell or charm or enchantment, or a spirit-binding.

🔔 Personally, spirit-binding is something I do as little as possible simply due to my beliefs holding the autonomy of spirits in very high regard. However, sometimes situations arise that call for it, and I’m aware that not all bindings are unwilling. Far from it – and some spirits are dangerous when unbound.

🔔 As an animist (believing that all things, including inanimate objects, contain a spirit of their own), I consider gently nudging a spirit back into its physical form a sort of semi-binding, and that can be useful.

I’ll leave you all with a note that I am an urban apartment-dwelling witch through and through, so I understand that we can’t all be jangling away at all hours. I myself have a glass windchime in my front window that makes a distinct but muted sound when disturbed by passers-through, and highly recommend wooden ones also. I also only use my small and relatively quiet suzu bell for my crafting – one given to me by my baba herself.

Feel free to add any of your own findings, and happy tolling.

🌙 Witchcraft Masterpost: 🛁 Cleansing and Purifying Energy

purify (verb) - to remove contaminants 

We’ve all seen it in the horror movies. A cute, unimposing family moves into a new home, and things start getting creepy. Doors open and close on their own, strange voices start showing up on the baby monitor, and the kids are playing hide and seek with someone that isn’t there. Then, before these suburbanites know what hit ‘em, there are G H O S T S™ everywhere. How do these innocent protagonists often deal with their new spiritual occupation? Do they move away? Do they call their friendly neighborhood witch for assistance like any responsible ghostbuster would do? No. Out comes their handy dandy Sage Stick™ as they attempt to cleanse the house of evil entities. 

While the idea is visually appealing enough for cinema (and while ritualistic sage cleansing is a real and effective Native American practice), in the movies it never really seems to do anything but piss the demonic entity off. Metaphysically, these newbies might be failing because there is much more that goes into cleansing energy than just burning some sage and walking around your house. 

Why do you need to purify things? 

Physical objects are like energy sponges, and as time goes on, they soak up the energy of everything around them. Lots of witches these days are familiar with how crystals operate, so I’ll use a crystal as an example. 

The first time you pick up a crystal in a shop, it absorbs some of your energy as it rests in your hand. As you purchase it, it absorbs the energy of the register. It absorbs some of the energy of the bag it’s put in, and it absorbs some of the energy around you as you walk out of the shop and back to your car. It absorbs the sound of you singing along to the radio on the car ride home. It absorbs the energy of your house as you take it inside. It absorbs the energy of your altar as you first set it down. It absorbs the energy of every spell you do with it, and it absorbs the energy of everything that happens around it - every time you speak or worry or laugh or cry or anything. It is always there, absorbing and collecting whatever ambient energy it encounters. 

These stray energies build up over time, eventually clouding the crystal and disrupting its own unique vibration. After a while, the crystal might start to act erratically in spellwork, even backfiring at times. Under extreme stress (environments that are particularly erratic, emotional, and/or negative), the crystal may even build up so much excess energy that it shatters. 

Even worse, let’s say you have the crystal in your pocket one day, and you get into an argument with someone. The crystal will also absorb that aggressive, argumentative energy. If it absorbed enough of it, it will start attracting that energy to you whenever you carry it or use it. You might start getting into a lot of arguments all of a sudden, and obstacles might start appearing everywhere you turn. The same could happen if the crystal encountered any negative or oppressive energy, like sadness, regret, or suffering. (Side note: When houses/locations absorb a lot of violent, stressful, aggressive energy, they often begin to manifest poltergeists)

The purpose of cleansing/purifying, as a witch, is to rid an object of these built-up energies - to bring it back to a pure, unaltered state. You are essentially setting it free of all its baggage and allowing it to vibrate how it naturally wants to. 

It isn’t only crystals that can be/need to be purified (tho crystals are much more sensitive to energy than almost anything else and do need to be purified regularly). Literally any object you can imagine holds onto energy in some way. Some other things that you may want to cleanse at least every once in a while: 

altar / altar space

bedroom

car

living space

ritual tools

talismans

yourself 

Basic Energy Cleansing

There are an infinite number of techniques you can use to cleanse or purify something. Every culture throughout history has invented some way of doing this, so study up and see what works. 

The most basic way of cleansing something uses only your own energy and willpower. Be mindful, though, that it is easy for stray energies to latch onto you when using this technique, so grounding afterwards is imperative. 

Begin by heightening and focusing your own energy through meditation, focused breathing, or whatever way you personally choose to harness your own energy.

Connect with the object you wish to cleanse. Touch it with your bare skin, and allow your energy to pour into it. Feel it out, and try to detect anything contaminating the object - anything that feels wrong, conflicting, or out of place.

After you have successfully attuned to the object, visualize your energy rushing through the object like a stream of water.

As it passes through, visualize your energy pulling out everything that doesn’t feel like it belongs, anything contaminating or polluting. When I use this spell, I like to imagine particles of dust or sand being swept up and taken away. 

After your energy has flowed through the object completely, allow it to flow back into you. Don’t let it rest inside of you, though. Immediately take the contaminated energy and direct it firmly into the ground, where it can be taken away from you and completely recycled by the earth. 

Repeat this process until the object’s energy has been entirely cleansed of anything that feels conflicting or out of place. 

Other Techniques

Cleansing with salt: If the object is small enough, put the object in a bowl and cover it in white or pink salt. Allow it to sit overnight. 

Cleansing with water: If the object can safely be put in water (some crystals cannot), place it in a bowl of clean water (preferably river water, ocean water, rain water, or moon water) and allow it to sit overnight. If possible, leave it outside in the moonlight while its soaking.

Cleansing with smoke: Very similar to the basic energy cleansing technique described above, except you visualize the tendrils of smoke reaching into the object and pulling out any contaminants. Instead of grounding the energy afterward, open a window and allow the wind to carry the smoke away. 

Cleansing with sound: Also similar to the energy cleansing technique described above, except sound waves penetrate the object and expel anything that shouldn’t be there. Love to do this with Tibetan singing bowls, but you can really use any kind of sound, even your own voice. Instead of grounding the contaminant energies afterward, imagine the sound waves pushing them very far away from you. 

Cleansing with sunlight/moonlight: Expose the object to bright sunlight/moonlight and let it sit for a while. 

Cleansing a living space with a broom: Sweep all of your floors, preferably sweeping east to west, starting in the center of your home and moving outwards. End by sweeping all of the collected dust out the door.

Self-Cleansing Bath/Shower: Essentially the same idea as cleansing an object with water, except you’re doing it to yourself in the shower or bath. Pro-Tip: Use a bath bomb with strong peppermint, sandalwood, or frankincense oils for added power. 

Brightest blessings, and best of luck 🕉

I made some lavender milk for my spirit companion L <3  I used this recipe if anyone was interested in making their own! It tastes wonderfully sweet and floral

A little tarot spread you can do with a deity you want to start working with! :D Did this when I approached Hades and it helped me get a better understanding of what he’s like and what he wants me to achieve and do ~

get a reading now

Witch Tip

the-eye.eu is a huge public database that has countless free PDFs of all sorts of occultist books and grimoires. Go forth and read.

Stoner Witch Tips:

✨Sharpie pen sigils on your lighter.

✨Blow smoke into a jar to use in spell work.

✨Little nugs as offerings to nature or your deities.

✨Keep your ashes in a tightly closed container for spell work. (Do not breathe the ashy dust this creates*)

✨Make sure you drink enough water, especially if you smoke heavily.

✨Write sigils with your resin.

✨After cleaning your pipe/ rig set it out in the moonlight.

✨Make knot magic with hemp string.

✨Say a chant or incantation as you blow the smoke out of your lungs and release it to the universe.

Mabon * urban witchcraft * some tips from traveling mystic *

Autumn is a special time for me when I stay in the mountains - at remote villages, wandering in the forest and climbing mountains to gather last herbs. And now to find myself in the heart of chaotic Hanoi, it’s completely different experience… 

These are the ways to celebrate autumnal transition, Mabon while staying in the chaos of city life:

***share the blessings*** 

open free tarot readings at your favorite coffee shop

volunteer your skills for project \ organisation which inspires you

invite your friends to sit together in autumnal moon light and share some food and stories

give away things  

***slow down and turn your mind towards meditation***

don’t rush for new projects

cut off senseless noise (music, small talks and messaging)

drink more water and keep healthy diet, enjoy the fruits of the season

walk with awareness, breath with awareness

burn candles in the evening while drinking your tea and reflecting on your accomplishments, goals, approaches to the things, journal about that

***do magic***

sigils on balance, healing, letting go old things, get rid of blockages  

do shadow work with tarot cards, journaling or create shadow altar and explore its opportunities

to dive into the energy of this time, pray, dream, visualize and do other witchy things - create a space filled with autumnal leaves, fruits, sweet gifts of nature, put there some ancestor photos, add symbols of death and old age

***have  long walks in parks and around city lakes, watch old people and kids***

***de-clutter your house or backpack, finish old projects***  

***share stories with travelers you meet on the road***

***drink local tea***

***use crystals: carnelian, lapis lazuli, tiger eye, amber, serpentine, amethyst, clear quartz 

and herbs: rose hips, chamomile, yarrow, marigold, sage, saffron***

do you like judaism?

do you like video games?

well, my rabbi streams himself playing mario kart and talking about jewish things on twitch every friday morning at 9am pacific time. other mornings, less gaming, but just as much jewish learning

he also has a youtube

it’s a fun time, check it out when you have a chance