Some people spell magic as magick. I think this is cool. There are various reasons why people do this, and I also have my own.
So, I guess it started with Aleister Crowley using "magick" to distinguish between magic that is real and practical vs. magic that is, I guess, theoretical or "fake." I've heard other people use magick to mean the craft that is performed vs. magic that Hollywood puts out. (Side note: I've been a video editor for years, so I have great respect for "Hollywood magic" and editing in general, because I know there is real magic there!)
Why do I use magick with a K? Well, sometimes I do and sometimes I don't, but there are basically two reasons.
The first reason is that I just think it looks cooler. I think it adds that little extra touch, brings the word out of Muggle territory and into the realm of something that is actually powerful and real. It looks arcane and makes me feel nice and witchy, and I see nothing wrong with that!
The second reason is that the K just makes me think of Krishna. I want Krishna to be a part of every aspect of my life, my magickal practice included. I think it makes my personal practice very strong. It's just a little, tiny reminder, and something that probably would't apply to most other witches, but for me, it's special.
Monday, October 10, 2016
Thursday, September 1, 2016
Self Love Stories: My Journey with Self Love
This post is in response to Kelly-Ann Maddox’s #SelfLoveStories. Here is her video if you want to know more.
My journey with self love, like most people's, has been full of ups and downs. Overall, I believe my ability to love myself was very strong throughout my life, or I never would have made it through childhood and adolescence. I just know that somewhere when I was a child, somebody told me that I deserved to be loved and that I could be anything I wanted to be. I believed those things, and took them to heart, so when people tried to tell me I couldn’t do something because of “X,” my immediate reaction was, “well, clearly they don’t know what they’re talking about,” and I could easily dismiss the haters and naysayers.
This got more and more difficult as I got older. I had a reaction to asthma medicine when I was 8, which made me gain a lot of weight overnight. Combined with my standard American diet, I became obese. The bullying and lack of family support to help me get healthy led to emotional eating. Eventually, I lost most of the weight and was no longer obese, just overweight, but I was still an emotional eater. And I still secretly hated myself for the way I looked and felt.
Loving yourself gets hard when the people who are supposed to love you unconditionally - your parents - don’t. I really struggled to keep loving myself, even when I was hating so many things about myself. I was called a selfish bitch on a daily basis for trying to take responsibility of myself and putting me first. I was raised to believe that my only worth was to sacrifice everything I was and loved for others, and I was rejecting that paradigm. I was struggling to love myself and at the same time being told that I was a hateful person who didn’t deserve it.
You can’t help others if you can’t take care of yourself, and anyone who would demand that of you needs way more help than you can give them. They also need self love.
The biggest tip I have for self love is to break away from people who make you feel like you don’t deserve it. This can be very difficult, but it is the most important. You may have to completely disassociate with family, leave friends behind, and find new people to be around like I did. It was the best decision.
The next thing, is to realize that you do deserve unconditional love — FROM YOURSELF! You will rarely get it from others, but you can get it from yourself. This may take a long time to accomplish, but it’s worth the effort.
I’m still struggling with my weight, and have lost and gained several times. I got to my goal weight, but still hadn’t addressed emotional eating, so I gained it back and then more, despite being incredibly athletic and eating healthy foods. But I didn’t give up on myself. I love myself so I’m committed to being healthy and happy. I already knew the ways that didn’t work for me, so I kept looking for ways to help me understand my body and how to care for it.
I have also done some serious shadow work, which is ongoing. In order to love myself unconditionally, I have to look at the ugly parts and the things that I hate and address them. It can be messy sometimes, but mostly it’s a relief. Now, those little shadows of myself aren’t manifesting as a false sense of hunger.
It has taken a long time to get to where I can love myself even though I’m not satisfied with how I look or feel right now. I think this is an important distinction that isn’t really addressed enough. I’m not happy with everything about myself, but I love myself anyway, and don’t hate the parts that aren’t perfect. That’s the key element. Loving yourself means accepting all parts of who you are, but you still have room to grow and change.
I’m still hungry for life and health and magic and love. And then I feed myself with it! I wish the same for you!
My journey with self love, like most people's, has been full of ups and downs. Overall, I believe my ability to love myself was very strong throughout my life, or I never would have made it through childhood and adolescence. I just know that somewhere when I was a child, somebody told me that I deserved to be loved and that I could be anything I wanted to be. I believed those things, and took them to heart, so when people tried to tell me I couldn’t do something because of “X,” my immediate reaction was, “well, clearly they don’t know what they’re talking about,” and I could easily dismiss the haters and naysayers.
This got more and more difficult as I got older. I had a reaction to asthma medicine when I was 8, which made me gain a lot of weight overnight. Combined with my standard American diet, I became obese. The bullying and lack of family support to help me get healthy led to emotional eating. Eventually, I lost most of the weight and was no longer obese, just overweight, but I was still an emotional eater. And I still secretly hated myself for the way I looked and felt.
Loving yourself gets hard when the people who are supposed to love you unconditionally - your parents - don’t. I really struggled to keep loving myself, even when I was hating so many things about myself. I was called a selfish bitch on a daily basis for trying to take responsibility of myself and putting me first. I was raised to believe that my only worth was to sacrifice everything I was and loved for others, and I was rejecting that paradigm. I was struggling to love myself and at the same time being told that I was a hateful person who didn’t deserve it.
You can’t help others if you can’t take care of yourself, and anyone who would demand that of you needs way more help than you can give them. They also need self love.
The biggest tip I have for self love is to break away from people who make you feel like you don’t deserve it. This can be very difficult, but it is the most important. You may have to completely disassociate with family, leave friends behind, and find new people to be around like I did. It was the best decision.
The next thing, is to realize that you do deserve unconditional love — FROM YOURSELF! You will rarely get it from others, but you can get it from yourself. This may take a long time to accomplish, but it’s worth the effort.
I’m still struggling with my weight, and have lost and gained several times. I got to my goal weight, but still hadn’t addressed emotional eating, so I gained it back and then more, despite being incredibly athletic and eating healthy foods. But I didn’t give up on myself. I love myself so I’m committed to being healthy and happy. I already knew the ways that didn’t work for me, so I kept looking for ways to help me understand my body and how to care for it.
I have also done some serious shadow work, which is ongoing. In order to love myself unconditionally, I have to look at the ugly parts and the things that I hate and address them. It can be messy sometimes, but mostly it’s a relief. Now, those little shadows of myself aren’t manifesting as a false sense of hunger.
It has taken a long time to get to where I can love myself even though I’m not satisfied with how I look or feel right now. I think this is an important distinction that isn’t really addressed enough. I’m not happy with everything about myself, but I love myself anyway, and don’t hate the parts that aren’t perfect. That’s the key element. Loving yourself means accepting all parts of who you are, but you still have room to grow and change.
I’m still hungry for life and health and magic and love. And then I feed myself with it! I wish the same for you!
Saturday, August 13, 2016
Power and Control in Spellcraft
One of the underlying concepts of spell work in witchcraft is that you have some ability to control yourself or the forces around you to achieve some desired result.
One of the most important lessons in the Bhagavad-Gita is that individual souls — jivas — have limited power, and are not the Supreme Controller. However, most souls in the material world are trying to be supreme controllers.
So, how do I reconcile seemingly contradictory ideas into one practice?
First, I’ll start off by saying that I am completely, fully aware that I am not the Supreme Controller. When I was younger, I exhausted myself trying to control and change my situation, and finally drove myself to the point where I had no choice but to surrender. I could not control everything, I had very limited control. My control was limited mostly to how I reacted to things that are outside of my control. I also finally realized that surrender is not the same as defeat, but the beginning of true victory. This realization was the start of my deeper spiritual practice. It was during this time that the desire to know who my deities were became the central focus of my spell work and meditations.
Now, I know clearly that Sri Krishna is the Supreme Controller of the Universe. So, where does that leave me and spell craft? How can I cast spells if I’m not in control?
Well, I was never in control before (just under the illusion of it), and it didn’t stop me from casting successful spells, so being “in control” is actually not a requirement for successful spell work. But not being in control does not mean I am powerless. In fact, I understand who really is in control, and that knowledge is very powerful.
I do have influence and control over myself and my mind. Through meditation, chanting, and listening, I know that my thoughts and choices and reactions are within my sphere of control. I believe the Law of Attraction is a real thing, because I’ve lived it. The difference with me and another practitioner of the Law of Attraction is that I understand that Krishna is the source of all things, so instead of putting my desires to the Universe, I go directly to the source. I ask Sri Sri Radha Krishna directly to help me achieve what I want to achieve. My spell work is largely prayer, with offerings of objects, food, candles, and most importantly, my intentions and love.
My relationship to God is one of surrender, but I’m also taking responsibility and action in that relationship. I don’t just ask for something and sit around until it happens. I put forth my energy and work with Them. And if something does not work out the way I wanted it to, then I’ve learned to not be upset about it, but instead to be thankful. I trust that Sri Sri Radha Krishna have my very best interest at heart, and since they have perfect knowledge and I don’t, if I ask for something and don’t get it, I trust that the thing I asked for was not in my best interest, and that there’s something better instead.
Getting to this place has taken a lot of spiritual growth and maturity, because the tendency is to pout or throw a tantrum when we don’t get what we want, especially when we’ve done a lot of work to get it. But understanding what my power is, and where that power comes from really helps me keep my perspective, and forces me to deeper levels of surrender. In this way, I can better work in harmony with God, and not try to resist the larger workings of the Universe.
One of the most important lessons in the Bhagavad-Gita is that individual souls — jivas — have limited power, and are not the Supreme Controller. However, most souls in the material world are trying to be supreme controllers.
So, how do I reconcile seemingly contradictory ideas into one practice?
First, I’ll start off by saying that I am completely, fully aware that I am not the Supreme Controller. When I was younger, I exhausted myself trying to control and change my situation, and finally drove myself to the point where I had no choice but to surrender. I could not control everything, I had very limited control. My control was limited mostly to how I reacted to things that are outside of my control. I also finally realized that surrender is not the same as defeat, but the beginning of true victory. This realization was the start of my deeper spiritual practice. It was during this time that the desire to know who my deities were became the central focus of my spell work and meditations.
Now, I know clearly that Sri Krishna is the Supreme Controller of the Universe. So, where does that leave me and spell craft? How can I cast spells if I’m not in control?
Well, I was never in control before (just under the illusion of it), and it didn’t stop me from casting successful spells, so being “in control” is actually not a requirement for successful spell work. But not being in control does not mean I am powerless. In fact, I understand who really is in control, and that knowledge is very powerful.
I do have influence and control over myself and my mind. Through meditation, chanting, and listening, I know that my thoughts and choices and reactions are within my sphere of control. I believe the Law of Attraction is a real thing, because I’ve lived it. The difference with me and another practitioner of the Law of Attraction is that I understand that Krishna is the source of all things, so instead of putting my desires to the Universe, I go directly to the source. I ask Sri Sri Radha Krishna directly to help me achieve what I want to achieve. My spell work is largely prayer, with offerings of objects, food, candles, and most importantly, my intentions and love.
My relationship to God is one of surrender, but I’m also taking responsibility and action in that relationship. I don’t just ask for something and sit around until it happens. I put forth my energy and work with Them. And if something does not work out the way I wanted it to, then I’ve learned to not be upset about it, but instead to be thankful. I trust that Sri Sri Radha Krishna have my very best interest at heart, and since they have perfect knowledge and I don’t, if I ask for something and don’t get it, I trust that the thing I asked for was not in my best interest, and that there’s something better instead.
Getting to this place has taken a lot of spiritual growth and maturity, because the tendency is to pout or throw a tantrum when we don’t get what we want, especially when we’ve done a lot of work to get it. But understanding what my power is, and where that power comes from really helps me keep my perspective, and forces me to deeper levels of surrender. In this way, I can better work in harmony with God, and not try to resist the larger workings of the Universe.
Getting Back to my Roots: Tarot
I got my first tarot deck when I was 13. It was the Dragon Tarot, still one of my most beloved decks.
Over the last several months, I've received guidance through lots of meditation to get back into serious study of Tarot. I've never given it up, but I was using oracle decks more and hadn't really pushed my abilities or gone deeper into tarot.
For my birthday, I bought myself the Mermaid Tarot deck, and fell in love with its whimsy. I also bought myself a copy of Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom, which is an incredible resource. My husband also got me a tarot deck for my birthday, the Haindl Tarot. This is a serious deck and I haven't let it leave my side since I got it. Not only does it have Radha and Krishna in it, but it also has Brigid, and other Nordic, Celtic, Hindu, and Native American deities and imagery. Also, the High Priestess card has seals. Seals are my spirit animal and always signify to me that I'm on the right path.
I made a tarot journal specifically for my studies. Not sure where I got the idea to have a dedicated journal for tarot, but it's been nice to keep all my notes in one place.
What's This About: An Introduction of Sorts
‘Sup Bitches Witches?! So, what the hell is this Transcendental Witch blog about? That’s a good question, let me see if I can work it out.
I have other blogs and outlets for my spiritual and creative pursuits. However, I’ve been feeling like one very important aspect of myself was kind of being neglected, or not honored properly, and that is my magical self.
You see, witching is not my religion. It is part of my spiritual path, and I am religious, but magic and witchcraft were what led me to find my spiritual path, and once I found it, I took a step back from practicing any craft to just focus on the new knowledge before me. And that was awesome and cool and I have no regrets, but I’ve been in a place where I could bring my magical practices back into my life, better informed and way stronger than ever before, because I had finally developed a relationship with my patron deities and approached them in the appropriate way. Now, I’m able to use my magical interests and abilities to further deepen my connection. My path is one that seeks to transcend the mundane, and my craft helps me to do that.
I’m a Hare Krishna. You probably haven’t heard of a witch who was a Hare Krishna before. I’m not surprised. I am definitely not a normal Hare Krishna, and I would never consider myself to be an example of what a Hare Krishna should be. There is a very strong lineage of knowledge and rituals and ways of being a Hare Krishna that has been handed down through gurus for thousands of years. That is sacred and I respect that. I don’t have a guru, I am not initiated. I took on a spiritual name myself, because I don’t know if I will ever have a guru. And because I don’t have an earthly guru and am not initiated, there are some who would consider me less serious, fringy, or a heretic. I can understand their point and would never argue with them. They’re not wrong (except about how seriously I actually do take my spiritual life.) Spiritual life is very difficult, and that is why certain rules exist to keep people on the path. For them, my way would be totally wrong. I have tried temple life, and I didn't fit there any more than other devotees would feel comfortable casting a circle. So I keep quiet about my witchiness in devotee circles out of respect for those people. I do not want to offend, and I feel no need to argue.
I am a witch and a Hare Krishna, and after years of meditation and prayer and worrying that I’m doing something wrong, I’ve finally come to accept that I can be both and that is the right path for me, because I am a single, individual soul with my own, personal relationship with The Divine. My heart brought me to Krishna, and I trust it to lead the way. Besides, there is, actually, a LOT of overlap in the rituals.
So this blog is a space where I can express who I am and what I have to offer to the world in a more honest way. Although there is judgementalism in the world of witches just as there is in any other group, I find magical communities to be, on the whole, very accepting of individual eccentricities even when there is disagreement. And I think I need that right now. I have been withdrawn from the world for a long time, and I feel like it’s time for me to connect to it again.
My life has always been a mixture of cultures and traditions, and I dovetail those things with devotion. I see magic as a way for me to connect with God, to interact with the world in a positive way, and to focus my energies. Because of that, I don’t see it as separate from my spiritual path, but deeply ingrained. :)
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