“Life Is Suffering. It Is Hard. The World Is Cursed. But Still, You Find Reasons To Keep Living.“

Tarot Cards and Their Meanings

Wands:

Ace: Beginnings, birth, energy, self-image, new opportunities

2: Potential, planning, choices, contemplation

3: Long-term, foresight, putting things into motion

4: Rewards, celebrate good times (come on!), teamwork, home

5:Competition, conflict, brainstorming

6: Praise, self-confidence, recognition, role model

7: Defense, threat, perseverance

8: Progress, energy, swiftness

9: Perseverance, wounded, guarded

10: Responsibility, burden, stress or success

Page: Adventures, inspiration, ideas, journey, desires

Knight: Risk-taking, experiments, travel, fun, passion

Queen: Creativity, independence, friendly, optimistic, beauty

King: Leader, pride, energy, charisma, passion

Cups:

Ace: New feelings, awakening, imagination

2: Equality, respect, harmony, sharing

3: Friendship, celebration, fun

4:Withdrawal, indifference, boredom

5: Sadness, mourning, disappointment, regret, suffering

6: Kindness, caring, memories, childhood

7: Fantasy, illusion, creative brainstorming

8: Travel, retreat, spirit quest

9: Contentment, host, wish fulfillment

10:Happy home, shared love, peace, family

Page: Sensitive, gentle, Imaginative, kind

Knight:Romantic, flirt, artist, emotional intensity

Queen: Empathetic, sensitive, emotional, psychic, mother

King: Wise, calm, emotionally mature, father

Swords:

Ace:Truth, intellect, communication, clarity

2: Standstill, mediator, indecision

3: Loss, sorrow, betrayal

4: Rest, mental restoration, reflection

5: Defeat and self-defeat, irritability, arguments

6: Support, moving, retreat, mental healing

7: Gathering information,mental tests, strategy

8: Helpless thoughts, limiting beliefs, excuses

9: Worry, anxiety, insomnia, repressed thoughts

10: Finished, closure, give up

Page: Curious, student, intellect, thoughtfulness

Knight: Debate, explorer, rushing, revolutionary

Queen: Truthful, self-aware, teacher, intellect

King: Objective, intelligent, assertive, fair, logical

Pentacles:

Ace: Healthy beginnings, investing, grounded, opportunity

2: Play, changes, multitasking, adapting

3: Planning, employment, teamwork, assistance

4: Stable, saving, cautious, boundaries

5: Unstable, illness, supportive friends, lack of security

6: Charity, generosity, giving back, assistance

7: Assessment, trial and error, editing, feedback

8: Repetition, precision, commitment, meaningful work

9: Luxury, discipline, earned rewards, fruits of labor

10: Wisdom, home, wealth, legacy, home

Page: New project/job, Student, new studies, cautious

Knight: Loyal, dependable, hard working, practical

Queen: Mother, Fertile, down to earth, nurturing, protective

King:Wealthy, successful, loving father, stubborn, practical

Major Arcana:

The Fool: Trust, Beginning, open minded, innocence

The Magician: Will, personal power, intention, resourcefulness

The High Priestess: Inner Wisdom, Meditation, spirituality

The Empress: Mother, creativity, nurturing, sensuality

The Emperor: Power, structure, stability, father

The Hierophant: Responsibility, knowledge, teacher, belief system

The Lovers: Sexuality, union, love, cooperation

The Chariot: Determination, Control, momentum, competence

Strength: Courage, Strength/ inner strength, survival

The Hermit: Guidance, wisdom, perspective, solitude

Wheel of Fortune: Luck, expansion, destiny, change, movement

Justice: Ethics, law, balance, fairness, accountability

The Hanged Man: Release, waiting, surrender, sacrifice

Death: Regeneration, ending, closure, transformation

Temperance: Experimenting, creating, combining, compromise

The Devil: Limitations, attachments, commitment

The Tower: Sudden shock, chaos, destruction, questioning beliefs

The Star: Renewal, peace, optimism, boundlessness

The Moon: The shadow self, dreams, confusion, intuition

The Sun: Playfulness, acceptance, personal growth, enthusiasm

Judgement: Transition, maturing, reviewing

The World: Integration, connection, wholeness, completion, options

Hey guys! It’s been a long time but I’m working on some posts for later. I’m probably am going to work on a reversed version of the cards for next time. Thanks for reading!- Samantha

from the Japanese trailer for Pulp Fiction

Areas of Research for the Intermediate Witch

When you’ve covered all the basics, the next step is to pick some topics and study them in-depth. Take notes, whether they are online or by hand, and find creative ways to incorporate what you’ve learned into your practice. With depth of knowledge comes depth of understanding, and that will make you a stronger witch. Here are some ideas/topics to get started:

Mesopotamian magic (especially the role of astrology in Mesopotamia)

Go through each of the Sabbats and write down a summary of how they came about. What is their history, purpose and associated mythology?

Hermeticism and its influence on Western magic

The first recorded spells and incantations (hint: they were in ancient Sumer)

Who was Zoroaster?

John Dee and Enochian magic

Freemasonry

The Golden Dawn

The Salem Witch Trials, and how they affected legislation on, and public perception of, witchcraft

Carl Gustav Jung and his work on the connections between psychology and alchemy

Crystal elixirs

Shadow work

Mythology from a variety of cultures - you’re probably familiar with Zeus and Ra, but how much do you know about Ranginui and Papatuanuku? Knowing a variety of mythologies, whether you follow them or not, can help you better understand the deities you work with.

Other religions! It’s the same as mythologies - the more you know, the better.

Buddhist philosophy

Reiki

The fae

Botany - if you can, try to research the plants in your region, and devise correspondences for plants you can find in your local area based on their physical or medicinal properties. Just make sure to be mindful of local/native cultures if there are any.

Make a dream journal, and write down whatever you can remember about your dreams (don’t worry if it’s hard at first, the more you write them down the better you’ll get at remembering). Research possible dream meanings of any dreams that stand out to you!

Astrology, if you’re not already familiar with it. Astrology originated in ancient Mesopotamia as one of the first forms of divination, and as a result is the basis of a lot of magic today.

The natural world. The metaphysical is important but perhaps more so is the world to which it is attached. I’d recommend watching nature documentaries for this one.

Cover all your bases. If there’s a witchcraft 101 area that you never fully learned, now’s the time. Things like grounding, centering, circle casting, meditation, warding, visualisation… these are all important foundations that you need before you can try to build on your knowledge.

Agrippa

E T H E R E A L

The Ethics of Witchcraft

Before you begin practicing witchcraft, it’s a good idea to establish a set of ethical guidelines for your magical practice. It’s also a good idea to familiarize yourself with some of the big ethical debates/controversies within witchy communities.

When you’re talking about ethics in witchcraft, it’s kind of impossible to get around Wicca. Even though not all witches are Wiccans, a lot of people are introduced to witchcraft through Wicca, and a lot of these people still follow Wiccan ethics in their craft, even if they don’t identify as Wiccan.

Wiccan ethics can be summed up with a single phrase, which is called the Wiccan Rede. The Rede states: “An it harm none, do as you will.”

Some people interpret the Rede to mean “If it harms none, do what you want.” I personally think this is a little over simplified. The key to understanding the Rede is understanding the difference between “want” and “will.”

In her book Wicca For Beginners, Thea Sabin says, “Want is about earthly things, both trivial and important. Your will, however, is the force that drives you to your ultimate spiritual goal. It transcends want. It’s the thing that Joseph Campbell is referring to when he says, ‘Follow your bliss.’ Campbell’s ‘bliss’ is the inner knowing that puts you on the life path that will lead you to your highest mundane and spiritual purpose.”

So your “will” isn’t just the things you want: it’s your hearts’ desires that are in alignment with your highest good.

Because of this, a better interpretation of the Wiccan Rede would be “If it harms none, do what is in alignment with your higher purpose.” I think this is a great guiding principle for any magical practice, whether you identify as Wiccan or not.

A lot of witches who follow the Wiccan Rede also believe in a concept called the Threefold Law. The Threefold Law states that whatever you put out into the world will come back to you three times.

Some people interpret this to mean that whatever you put out into the world will come back to you three times as strong. Others think it means that whatever you put out will come back to you on three levels: physical, emotional, and spiritual. Either way, the concept is the same: whatever you put out into the universe will find its way back to you in some form.

Even if they don’t believe in the Threefold Law, a lot of witches believe in a similar concept called karma, which comes from Hinduism. In his book Many, Many, Many Gods of Hinduism, Swami Acuthananda says: “The law of karma states that your thoughts, words, and actions — good and bad — circle back to determine your future. Simply put, you are responsible for your own actions. If you plant goodness, you will reap goodness, but if you plant evil, it will come back and hurt you. It is the universal principle of cause and effect.”

The Threefold Law and karma are similar concepts. No matter which one they resonate with, many witches believe that what they put out into the world will eventually come back to them. This is why a lot of witches choose only to do positive or constructive magic, and it’s why many witches don’t perform curses or hexes, because they don’t want that negativity coming back to them.

However, there ARE witches who do not follow the Wiccan Rede or believe in karma, and there ARE witches who cast curses and hexes. For example, Hoodoo is one magic tradition that doesn’t include any of these concepts, and many Hoodoo practitioners have no problem with destructive magic like curses. But at the same time, a lot of Hoodoo practitioners believe that a spell won’t work unless it is justified — so a curse won’t be effective unless the target deserves it. It really depends on the beliefs and morals of the practitioner. [Note: Hoodoo is a closed tradition. I am mentioning it in this post as a real world example of a pro-cursing magic system, but you do not have to practice Hoodoo to be pro-cursing.]

Cursing has a very long history all over the world. In Ancient Egypt, doctor-magicians treated patients by cursing the disease that was making them sick. In Ancient Rome, people would write curses on stone or lead tablets and bury them in the ground to ask the gods or spirits to carry out the curse — this is another case where the curse would only work if the gods felt it was justified. In ancient Ireland, poets could create a satire of someone, which was essentially a way of calling them out for doing something wrong. If the satire was true, it could cause blisters on the face of the person being satirized, or even cause their death. If the satire was not true, the curse would be directed back on the poet.

In most of these historical cases, it again seems like curses were only believed to work if the target deserved them, and there were serious consequences for cursing an innocent person. These are all things to keep in mind when deciding if you want to include cursing and other destructive magic in your practice.

Cursing is one of the biggest ethical debates in witchcraft, but there are others. Another big debate is whether or not it’s okay to do spells on other people.

A lot of witches choose not to do any magic that might violate another person’s free will. For example, a lot of witches will not do a love spell on a specific person. You can do a spell to attract a partner, or even to attract a certain type of person, but using magic to make someone specific fall in love with you violates that person’s free will.

For me, personally, consent is really important. If I want to do a spell for a friend or family member, even if it’s a helpful, positive spell, I only do it if they’ve asked me to or if I’ve gotten their permission. This way I know that my magic isn’t going against what they want.

Other witches feel like it’s okay to do helpful magic for other people without telling them about it. Most religious people don’t ask permission to pray for their loved ones, so some witches feel like they don’t need to ask permission to do positive spells for others. Again, it really depends on your personal ethics, but I’m of the opinion that it’s always best to have informed consent from everyone involved.

Of course, all of this is assuming that you choose to keep your witchcraft practice separate from your religious or spiritual practices. There are witches who choose to incorporate their spiritual beliefs into their magical practice. We’ve already talked about Wiccan ethics. A Christian witch will follow Christian ethics in their magic. An Muslim witch will follow Muslim ethics. A Buddhist witch will follow Buddhist ethics. And so on.

Before you start doing spellwork, you need to sit down and figure out your personal ethics. I recommend literally writing out a set of rules or guidelines for your ethical magical practice, before you ever cast a spell. You can refer back to those rules whenever you encounter an ethical question in your craft.

Beltane☀️🔥

What is Beltane?

Beltane is celebrated on May 1st although some people choose to celebrate it from April 30th to May 1st. Beltane is a day for fun, light-hearted celebration, love, and it is often represented by maypole dancing and performing fire rituals to honor the Mother Goddess and Sun God. The days are getting longer and all life is bursting with potent fertility and sexuality on earth is at its peak.  Beltane celebrations are filled with feasts and sun magick, the name Beltane means “fire of Bel”. Beltane is a time to watch what you’ve been manifesting and working so hard towards come to life before your eyes. Celebrate, laugh, love, drink, eat and have a good time!

Ways to Celebrate

Play music that gets you feeling happy and excited. Beltane is a celebration of abundance and high energy, so play music that raises your energy

Prepare something in the kitchen. Make a food that reminds you of the coming summer months, share it with whoever you live with if you can/want to

Get crafty! You could draw, paint, write or even just work on a project for yourself. It could really be anything, as long as you’re creating it.

Light some candles or incense! Lighting fires on Beltane is tradition. So however you can safely have a fire lit nearby, have it burning while you do any of the other activities listed above.

Flower gathering

Nature walks

Washing your face with morning dew

Making Beltane bread

Colors🌈

Red

White

Green

Blue

Yellow

Brown

Pink

Crystals💎

Amber

Bloodstone

Citrine

Carnelian

Agate

Malachite

Moonstone

Ruby

Emerald

Sapphire

Rose quartz

Herbs🌿

Angelica

Mint

Mugwort

St. John’s wort

Yarrow

Thyme

Hawthorn

Flowers🌸

Foxglove

Bluebells

Daisy

Lilac

Food 🥐

Bread

Cereal

Honey

Cherries

Oatmeal

Strawberries

Wine

Salad

  I hope you all have a wonderful Beltane and I cant wait to see how you all celebrated!