**This is an excerpt from the book I am currently working on. If you’re interested in seeing more, stay tuned for updates. I will occasionally post excerpts from time to time, some long some small. If you like what you’re reading so far, you should keep an eye out for its release date for The Power in Your Hand (coming soon). With that in mind, let me know if you’d like to see more in-depth posts about any of these topics! I’d be happy to expand on some of them in their own blog post.
Spell Work is a very broad concept. There’s a lot of places you can go with it, and each one has its own use. I approach things very eclectic, but some people are much more focused in their spells. Things like candle or knot magic are often easy starting points. It can be hard to decide what you’d like to focus on, so I usually recommend trying things as they interest you and see what sticks.
When we look at an overall approach at spell work and witchcraft as a whole, you’ll find there’s a lot of ‘subcategories’ to spells and witchcraft. Hearth witch, baneful witch, left hand practitioner, chaos magic–the list truly goes on. You’ll notice in the spells and recipes section I use a lot of elements in my spells. This is by choice-there are some that are very simple and easy to do! I see candle magic and knot magic are often recommended to those first starting out, as they are easy to utilize, learn, and if you need to: hide. I often find there’s large levels of overlap as well, and some things translate to other forms of witchcraft very easily. Color associations play a large part in candle magic. You can take that knowledge to art magic. You can also use that information with glamours and beauty magic as well. Learning a few basics can set you up to take that information for your entire path if you nurture that knowledge. Overall, I recommend finding something that really calls to you. This way you’ll have a lot of interest in picking it up and learning. Just be sure to remember you are learning it’s okay to make mistakes and have pitfalls-it’s about how you recover from them.
The main things I turn to in my spells are often candles, herbs, crystals, symbols and sigils. I’ll be breaking down blood magic in its own chapter, so we’ll start by looking at the others.
Candles
Candle magic is a relatively simple process, but still beautiful in its own right. They are also seen as fast workers in manifestation, and many recommend them for if you want a spell to take hold sooner and fade quicker. Oftentimes these are good for one-off short-lived spells. If you want them to last longer, you can use them in conjunction with other spells to get the desired results. Candle magic is mainly based on color correspondences! Below you’ll find a list of some of those correspondences. Now after you select the color that resonates with you and your intentions you would focus on that intention, possibly anoint the candle with oils or a carving on its side, and then you would light and meditate with this candle. As it burns, focus a lot on your intention and once you feel enough time has passed (or the candle has burnt down completely) put out the flame.
White: Purity, clarity, spiritual enlightenment
Red: Passion, love, courage
Green: Abundance, prosperity, growth
Blue: Healing, tranquility, communication
Yellow: Success, creativity, optimism
Purple: Intuition, psychic abilities, spiritual power
Black: Protection, banishing, absorption of negative energy
Grey: Neutrality, balance, neutrality
Pink: Love, affection, compassion
Orange: Creativity, enthusiasm, vitality
Herbs
Herbs in magic all have a correspondence. Now unlike colors, there are a lot of herbs that can correspond with a lot of things, so I cannot give you a ‘starter’ list on what means what, but I can give you a list of ones I feel are always good to have on hand, are beginner friendly, and relatively easy to get! They all have different correspondences, and it’s up to you how to implement it. Whether you’d prefer to cook, put them in jars, burn them, or drink them in tea blends there’s a lot of options. Now obviously if you intend to ingest the herbs make sure you order food grade herbs, and check if they are toxic to humans or animals before consuming them. This is not a complete list of herbs, nor is it a ‘starter’ shopping list-these are my suggestions for what you should grab but you should add more variety if you plan to use herbs, especially in cooking. Treat these like add-ons to what you want to get.
Rosemary: Often treated as a universal herb, and is helpful to add for a substitution if you’re missing something. Very easy to get as well.
Salt: Energy, Balance, and Purification. Very easy to get, a standard ingredient in a lot of spells, can be mixed with other things to get different salt mixtures, wonderful in protection.
Charcoal powder: I recommend this because the biggest thing I hear when people make their own black salt is it’s not black enough. This is more so an aesthetic thing, you don’t NEED black black salt, but a lot of people find this very useful and enjoy it more. NOW it is also a great symbol of transformation when we look at how charcoal is made. Very good with self-related spells, like self love or growth.
Basil: Love, Protection, Enlightenment, Wealth and Luck, Purification, Divination. This is very common, and spans a variety of uses.
Mint: Virtue, Protection, Personal Strength, Hospitality. Mint is very good for self-growth spells, and is decently easy to come by.
Lavender: Relaxation, Intuition, Sleep, Dreams, Peace, Calm. This herb may be a bit harder to get loose, but is very common to find already in tea blends, and in some baked goods. Lavender is a good starter herb, with very distinct correspondences!
Rose Petals: Romantic Love, Self care, Passion, Sex, Lust. Rose petals are also something you may have to go out of your way for, but it’s common to find things like rose water, even just beauty products that contain rose due to its effects in skin care.
Mugwort: Dreams, Intuition, Self love, Cleansing, Attracting love and friends, Protection against negative energy. Mugwort is very versatile in positive effects. It can be used in many ways, mostly in dreams and intuition work. I’d say this is a herb that you will have to go out of your way to get, you’ll rarely find it in a grocery store, but it’s great to have on hand if you can get it.
Crystals
Crystals are a bit more complicated past the first layer, but if you plan to use them in addition to other forms of magic, or are just interested in them in general it can be fun to learn regardless! Crystals can be used in multiple ways, from just an addition to your spell all the way to using a crystal grid. For the most part I’ll be focused on adding crystals to other spell components but urge you to look more into them if they interest you. Now unlike other sections I don’t have much to offer in terms of where you should start or what you should use. This can vary based on how you’re approaching crystals. What I like to do is use flashier pieces to decorate a room to bring the properties to the room, and add smaller pieces like chips or small tumbles and raws in spell jars or money bowls. This is by no way the only way, it is a very simplified approach if I’m being honest, but it’s worked amazingly for me and my path–and I think my house looks great with its curated gemstones.
Now I will say I often see people ask about how to tell the validity of crystals that are sold online-and I get that one and can share a more definitive approach to vetting your crystal sellers. First and foremost, most metaphysical shops already vet who they buy from. You can also always ask about their process and about their sources. I’d wager it’s likely shady if they give vague answers or avoid the question. If you’re clear as to why you’re asking and they want to avoid giving answers there’s not a lot of good reasons for them to, outside the fear of losing a sale. If you don’t have a lot of physical stores near you, sometimes the next largest city will and they may have websites. I always suggest shopping from local shops, even if you’re buying online from them. Now if neither of these are an option vetting online stores can be a bit harder to do, and even fake stores can put on a really good front. Look at reviews, look for picture reviews specifically, and their business page. You can reverse image search their product images and look for other hits-watermarks are sometimes a good sign, but it’s not really indicative on its own. Pricing can also be a really big sign-is it heavily overpriced or underpriced? Super cheap crystals are not always a great deal-sometimes sellers do this to get people to ignore other red flags or to get people to buy it more readily because it’s cheaper. You may look a few times before buying a $30 dollar crystal-but $2? You may not blink. Now if everything looks good up to check-out, you have some options for testing different types of crystals to see if they’re real or not. A lot of it is dependent on the Mohs Hardness Scale, or other varieties of testing.
If you do not know what the Mohs Hardness Scale is, you’re about to find your new best friend in the crystal world. The Mohs Hardness Scale is a scale consisting of a leveling system, which places minerals on a level of 1-10 based on scratch resistance. This makes it easy to identify fakes as they will become damaged if not at least the same on the hardness scale. Now, this may mean you end up damaging crystals in the long term. But, sometimes you have to take the risk. Typically the tests are made by seeing if the crystal is damaged by things it shouldn’t be, proving it a fake, and if it’s real it’s untouched. Sometimes you may not be as lucky, especially if you need to check if something is dyed.
Typically to check for dyed crystals you will have to risk a level of damage, and that often stops people but the peace of mind is worth it. Most common is using rubbing alcohol on the surface to see if it takes any color off. Take a swab and place it on the mineral, and wipe it off with a slightly damp cloth. If you see any color on the swab the mineral is likely dyed. Some you may have to break a crystal open, or take other risky measures. It’s best to search the crystal you’re trying to figure out and use a test recommended specifically for it, and see if what you have fails those tests.
If it does there’s a likelihood it’s not a crystal at all and instead is something like resin, or glass shaped to look like crystals. SOmetimes it may be a different crystal that’s easy to pass off as another. Heated amethyst is very common to be sold as citrine, because it takes on a yellow and white tone. Beautiful! But not technically the same.
Symbols and Sigils
Symbols and sigils are also a very wide-encompassing subject. They’re very easy to combine with other forms of spell work because of this and they are easy to implement with very few materials. There’s not a large start up investment to this and can be hidden pretty easily. Sigils are more purposeful, drawn specific for their purposes. Symbols are more intuitive, and appeal to your perspective. We will all find different symbolism in different things, so this is a very open item. Using both in spells can add a lot of heavy ties to it, and its focus. You can use sigils to replace names as a taglock, you can use them to be the spell-placing places you’d like to see the manifestation, and you can use them as an addition to a spell.
Symbols I like to use to tie a spell more so to a specific feeling or moment. If you use something that is a symbol of loss to you it can tie the spell heavily to that overall feeling of loss. Because of this nature it’s hard to show you how or when to use them, but you’ll usually just know. Ultimately this is always an addition to my spell work, I like to treat it as a binding of the situation or feeling to the spell, like the glue that binds the spine of a book to its pages. It’s very situational, but you’ll notice I bring it up a lot in the Spells and Recipes Section.
Making Spells
Okay, so to preface this section we’ll be going over the general process of spell-making. Some people struggle picking up the basics of making their own spells, and I wanted to try and add a section breaking down the process and giving an example. I hope it helps!
Where do I start?
Overall, this does kind of depend on you. Where do you want to start? Is there a specific form of spell you’d like to do primarily? Some people have a specific form they prefer to work with. Think Kitchen Witches for example. They prefer to do their Witchin’ in the Kitchen! (Audience now laughs.) So think of meals that are prepared with herbs not just to taste, but to imbue the food with properties for what they wish to bring on. Or spell jars! Personally, I’m a HUGE fan of jarred spells, I love them. This can be a sort of mixture of different things in the jars but it’s all up to what I need at the moment of the spell. Not all my spells are spell jars-but if I can put it in a jar it’s going in a jar! (All of the early 2000s internet users just cringed deeply. I see you, my brothers and sisters.) There are many ways to structure and start, you’ll learn yours over time.
Personally I do feel spell jars are an easy way to start, but that may not be true for you. It’s important you do what resonates with you and your path. So, going off that, where do you start? When you’re just starting out you’ll find some common hurdles. A large one may be the accessibility of some things. Accessibility can be many things, your time, energy, money, space, how private you must keep your practice, and the list keeps going on. So look around-what is accessible to you at this moment? Start with that, this can vary to so many things. Herbs can be cheap and easy to hide if you buy them under the guise of cooking. And jars are easy to find for a cheap price at most craft stores! If you’ve seen my altar you know I have quite the collection of jars-most only cost me $1.99, while some I got as cheap as $0.99! Thrift stores can also be your best friend! I got a wall cabinet at a thrift store for $5! So if money is an issue, thrift it out! Plus, no one suspects anything if you just love a good deal! I mean a whole shelf unit for $5? I would consider putting distance between myself and anyone who thought this was a ‘bad’ thing.
Now what do you want the spell to do? For demonstration purposes I’m going to do a self protection spell, but these concepts apply to all spells, and you can expand on them in your own ways to make them more complex or intricate as you feel comfortable.
So when making a self protection spell, let’s start basic. You want to protect yourself, so what do you have around you as the base? This could be herbs, crystals, sigils-anything! For this demonstration let’s focus on herbs, but this concept can be applied to other things as well!
So what herbs are good for protection? Salt, Black Salt, Rosemary, Garlic, Cinnamon, Basil, and Ginger are common ones you either already have, or can even make yourself in the case of black salt! If you want to get a bit more in-depth, you can add things like crystals, color correspondences with candle wax, or even incense! As for this demonstration spell, we’re focused on protection-so let’s see what that would look like!
Let’s stay basic. Clear Quartz is good for protection. Dragons Blood Incense would be a good touch. Yellow candles can be used for protection as well! So how would we go about putting all these together for a spell? Once more, this depends on you! You can be as chill or extra with it as you want. Now how would I put it together?
Putting Your Spell Together
First step, you want to cleanse your materials. Candle, Crystal, and Jar. This is just so any energy that may have been there beforehand (if that’s something you believe in) doesn’t affect what you’re currently using them for. There are different methods for this, so finding one you prefer and resonates with your path is best! If you chose to use incense in your spell, it could double as smoke cleansing! I prefer to do some form of sound for cleansing, like bells or so.
Once you’ve done that, let’s move to assembly. Keep in mind this is what I do personally, you don’t have to follow my exact steps, remember this is a small example, and make sure you let yourself grow and step into your path with your spells!
When I assemble a spell jar, I add a layer that’s meant to protect the spell no matter what it is. Often this is an herb or herb blend for protection. Once I add that I melt candle wax to “seal” in my protection layer and then add the other herbs on top of that.
In this spell, we’d be adding Salt, Black Salt, Rosemary, Garlic, Cinnamon, Basil, and Ginger. Once those are in, I seal them with wax as well.
After my herb layer, I often add in any crystals or charms I may be adding. Since this is for protection I may add charms that show things like shields, or that represent protection. I would also add something as a form of taglock to myself since it’s for self-protection. Either a sigil, blood, or an artifact that represents me. Once I add those in, I close the jar.
After I close the jar, I use candle wax to seal it shut. This is so I can lock in my intentions, and the spell as a “finalized” handshake! Then I place it somewhere that is related to the spell’s purpose. Self-Protection, so I’d either keep on myself, or in an area I am at most frequently (usually the home).
Overview
Now you know all the steps in making your spell. This is a very loose guide on purpose. I want to give you the basics so you can run with it and make it your own! Now that you know the basic thought process behind it, you can expand and grow to fit your path more. Having that freedom to be able to sit down and say “this is what I need to do” is very freeing in Witchcraft. You won’t need me or anyone else to hand you a spell, you will just know what’s available to you and how to utilize it! I could tell you how I make specific spells-but who’s to guarantee you have the same materials as me? What’s accessible to me may not be for others, so it’s important to know how to use what you have to the best of your abilities! Even if that’s just knowing substitutions for things in spells you find, or how to craft one from what you have on hand.
Share your thoughts!