There’re a few different ways to use blood in your spell work. It is a powerful piece of yourself it into your work will simply strengthen your spell. Your blood is your life force, a piece of you, power from your very core. Even in the language we use about blood, we talk about it with deep emotion and connection. In the English language it’s common to see it used in a turn of phrase-some of these are even just adapted phrases from other languages. Phrases like “You make my blood boil” show deep hatred, claiming kin as your ‘Flesh and blood’ because of the familial bonds, or saying you put ‘blood, sweat, and tears’ into something to express how deeply you’ve poured your very being into a project. We can tell from the way we speak about blood that it carries a bit of weight in how we express ourselves regularly.
Examples of common (English) phrases using “Blood”
“You’re making my blood boil.”
“He did it in cold blood.”
“The new blood in the family is refreshing”
“The way she looked made my blood run cold.”
“We have really bad blood between us.”
“You’re my flesh and blood! Of course!”
“I put my blood, sweat, and tears into that work!”
There are many other additions to this list, and it makes sense what blood is to us. It can encompass connection, familial ties, and even our chosen companions-even as something we don’t often think about, it’s easy to understand why it is seen as a powerful aspect. A powerful amplifier in both speech and magic.
List of Blood Uses
- Added Ingredient to Amplify Spell’s purpose
- Tag-lock for a Target/Subject of a Spell (For the person the blood belongs to)
- Ceremonial Uses like ceremonial collection, celebration, or anointing tools
- Devotional Uses like offerings for entities
- Ritual Uses for Ritual Magic
- Sacrifice/Signature
- Gestures of the body
- An ingredient, added with emotional/physical intent
While there are many different uses here, I wouldn’t consider this an all-encompassing list. Realistically there are so many ways to apply and use blood I doubt I’ve experienced them all myself. I’ve mentioned before, it’s an amplifier, and most of its uses in this list fall into this application.
Think of blood like a speaker. You connect your phone and suddenly you can play music much louder than you could before. It makes your spell louder than it would’ve been. In spell work, a drop of blood is a Bluetooth speaker. It’ll amplify your spell, make it ‘louder.’
Some may use blood in ritual magic, using it to anoint tools and materials. It can also be used to connect one to the ritual, and often people use this with visualization to help them complete the ritual successfully. It can also work as a signature on a pact, or payment. Some will even offer blood in devotion, leaving it on the altars of those they worship. Sometimes it can hold a lot of emotion and intent in it as well, in terms of your feelings when you draw it. Being willing to bleed for something can hold a lot of weight, feelings, and energy behind it.
Now we are aware that blood is not shelf stable, so it’s also imperative to use fresh blood, which means if you do choose to draw blood you will need to do so around your work. I’ve seen practitioners use different methods to extend the life and use of the blood they draw, like drying it out and turning it into a fine powder, or coating salt with the blood and allowing it to dry, creating a blood salt. These methods will take a lot more prep and require careful measures in cleaning up after. I do have my recipe for Blood Salts up, if you’d like to look into this method.
Now, some cultures have a different approach or feeling with it comes to blood. A very common thing is you don’t need to do any ritualistic bloodletting to do blood magic. There’s no slicing up your arms, using leeches, or so on. It’s usually frowned upon to collect blood in an aggressive or violent way, from yourself or others. Many often have this mental image of fancy ritual daggers, and slicing parts of their arms or hands to bleed heavily. This is extremely far from most actual uses of it, and anyone who tells you otherwise is a bit edgy, and you should ignore them.
Different Forms of Collection
People have different methods of collection, and I go over some of the options in the section before, but I wanted to break them down a bit more. Now I do have a post planned for safety coming up soon, so we won’t go over that here but I do want to stress it is extremely important to be careful with the collection process. It’s still a biohazard, it’s still blood. No matter how and when you collect you’re at a level of risks. This is more so a brief look over the possibilities.
Many people get the mental image of large cuts and large amounts of blood, but truth is you can even use tree sap and resin to replace blood, should you prefer that. So long story short-you don’t have to hurt yourself for blood magic. The most you should experience is a small prick of the finger-anything outside of that has become excessive, and usually not needed.
Direct Collection: Pricking your finger with a medical tool, such as a diabetic lancet. You should not use things like sewing needles, it is not safe and causes more pain and damage.
Menstrual Blood: Two ways here. You can either use a menstrual cup, and empty the blood for what you’re using. If you prefer pads or tampons some people will place them in water, and use that to leech the blood into the water. Most use the blood and water mixture directly for the blood.
Alternatives: Tree sap and resin can be collected in multiple ways, and sometimes you can buy resin or sap online.
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