"Make sure you're in a good state of mind" this, and "Don't be afraid" that.

I took a long hiatus from my tarot practice but I feel called to return to it. I would love to pull cards for anyone who is interested. It’ll likely be somewhere between one and three cards (to prevent fatigue). i’ll be using a pay what you can structure! Pay me what you think is fair and not a cent more!

but then they did an episode where they established that even just fucking laying there for a half hour, not even sleeping just laying there and not even for an hour, makes a significant difference and you’ll feel way better

Here are a few of the spells/rituals I use for cleansing, household harmony, etc! :) 

Cleansing Simmer Pot/Floor Wash: 

- Rosemary, to clear out and ward off negative or stale energy.

- Garden sage (if you need a particularly strong cleansing. Sage does clear all energies, not just negative, so be aware)

- Mint, to purify and rejuvenate the space. 

- Rainwater to wash away old energy. 

- Some butterfly pea blossoms if you’re wanting to really transform the energy of the house, since transformation is a strong property of butterfly pea. 

- I sometimes add a bit of vanilla to add peace and calm to the house as it is cleansed.

Put all of the above ingredients either into a tea strainer/coffee filter, or just straight into a pot of water, depending on how you intend to use it. If you just intent to make a simmer pot, you can just put the herbs in as they are, but if you intend to add them to water to mop, or intend to use it to wipe down surfaces, I recommend putting them in something to strain them so loose herbs don’t end up on your surfaces. 

Cleansing Powder to Absorb Negative Energy:

- Salt, to clear and absorb negative energy 

- Black pepper, also to cleanse/banish negativity. 

- garden sage, if you want to add extra punch

- Baking soda, to absorb negativity. (I don’t have any real source for baking soda being used for that besides it’s physical properties of being useful for absorbing spills and cat puke, so I figure magickally it could work similarly). 

Mix these ingredients in a bowl, and sprinkle over an area you intend to sweep or vacuum with the intention that it will absorb any of the negativity lingering in the space. Then sweep or vacuum the space, and throw out the powder and with it, the negativity. 

Household Harmony Simmer Pot/Floor Wash: 

- Vanilla, for peace and happiness. 

- Cinnamon, for communication and harmony. 

- Apple peel, for prosperity in the home. 

- Coffee, to remove obstacles to family harmony, and for communication. 

- Rosemary, to protect the home from negativity. 

- Lavender, for peace and harmony. 

- Blackberry, for improved communication

Same as with the cleansing spell, this can be made into a simmer pot or sometime to wash surfaces with. If you use it to wash surfaces, I recommend you water it down quite a bit with some water and vinegar, or remove the blackberries so that the fruit doesn’t make the floor sticky or attract bugs. 

Connecting to your inner child is a great way to bring curiosity, simple joy and innocence into your life. Here is a simple spell I like to do when things feel overwhelming and I forget who I used to be… 

– 

You will need

Pen and paper

A blue candle

An object from your childhood

Inner child spell

⭐ Find a peaceful and quiet space to perform the spell. Light the blue candle. Blue is associated with happiness, laughter, innocence and childhood. 

⭐ Spend a few minutes looking at the object you brought - it could be anything ; a cuddly toy you used to love, letters from family members, jewellery you received as a child, etc. How does it make you feel? Can you remember the child you used to be? 

⭐ On the paper, make a list of things that made you happy as a child. What food did you like? What movie did you love so much that you watched it on repeat? What songs did you sing to yourself in your bedroom? What activity were you always up for? What book did you read under your covers at night, while pretending to sleep? 

⭐ Read through the list again. Highlight all the things you can still enjoy today.

This list is a mixture of classic associations and personal ones. If you disagree with some of them, that’s okay! Everyone’s devotion is different.

Aphrodite, Goddes of Love, Beauty, and Pleasure.

Associated with:

Animals: Doves, geese, swans, sparrows, shellfish, hares, bees and dolphins.

Element: Water.

Colors: Red, pink, white, salmon, light blue, and seafoam green.

Plants: Roses, apples, lettuce, myrtle, pomegranate, lime, and anemone flowers.

Stones: Pearls, rose quartz, aquamarine, jade, rubellite, morganite, emerald and garnet.

Tarot cards: The lovers and the suit of cups.

Perfumes/scents: Rose, the ocean, myrtle, myrrh, apple, vanilla, and vervain, strawberry.

Planet: Venus.

Day of the week: Friday.

About: What we think of as an almond is actually the “stone seed” of the almond tree. It is found inside of the inedible fruit of the almond tree, and grows similarly to peaches. There are two kinds of almond trees, sweet and bitter. Bitter almonds contain large amounts of cyanide and should not be eaten.

How to Grow: Within the United States, almonds do best in California, with it’s cool winters and hot summers. Almonds need a sunny area with well drained soil, and as little wind as possible. Once established, they only need watered once a week in normal conditions. Almond trees should be pruned back yearly, in the winter, to remove dead branches and allow for new growth. It can take an average of five years for an almond tree to bear fruit, and once it begins to do so, it should be fertile for as many as fifty years. Harvest the fruits in late summer, let them dry, and then open them up and remove the seeds, or almond nuts.

Medicinal Properties: Almonds are a source of vitamin E, copper, magnesium, and high quality protein. Those who consume nuts five times a week have about a 50 percent reduction in risk of heart attack according to the Loma Linda School of Public Health. Almonds added to the diet have a favorable effect on blood cholesterol levels, according to a clinical study by Dr. Gene Spiller, Director of the Health Research and Studies Center, Inc. Almonds lower the rise in blood sugar and insulin after meals. However, it is also recommend that pregnant individuals avoid almonds.

Magical Properties: Money, Prosperity, Wisdom, Love. Associated with Air.

Shadow work can feel very…vague to talk about. There’s a bad habit of just kind of handwaving things and hoping people figure it out on their own. Part of that is that it’s so intensely personal. It’s so hard to come up with things that will work for everyone. The other part is that I want people to experiment and add to what we know about shadow work so I don’t want to be too prescriptive in how I teach others to do it.

So, for this post I wanted to dig into some of the most basic skills I use in shadow work in the hopes it’ll help people no matter which methods or paths they take.

Describing Events Neutrally

I put this one first because I think it’s the most important and the more difficult. Our emotions cloud how describe events to ourselves and others. For us to look critically at actions or words, we really need to be able to describe them without intent or emotion. Now, I’m not saying to leave that out entirely, I’ll get to that next. But you have to be able to get a clear view of what was done. This is so important when working with anything that might be triggering. We are too used to describing events with the goal of justifying thoughts, feelings, and actions and in shadow work it helps to break that instinct where you can.

When you can describe events neutrally to start with, it’s easier to see whether the feelings where in line or out of line with what happened. Were you way over reactive? Maybe under reactive? It’s easier to judge that when you have a neutral account to work with.

To practice, try listing out some events as they happen neutrally. An example might be after a tense interaction with someone, listing out what was said and done. If you can, get someone who was there to look at it and someone who wasn’t there to look at it and see what they say as far as how factual and neutral the account is.

Naming Feelings

Many many people cannot tell you what they’re feeling. There’s a myriad of reasons for this but no matter where it comes from it hurts shadow work. Your mood is like an internal weather system, you need to be able to do shadow work that’s appropriate for the weather. How you dig into things if gonna be different if your reaction to feeling trapped is to give up and binge movies or to lash out in anger. Gotta know what you’re working with.

It’s absolutely vital that you practice naming your emotions in day to day life. I did a week where I had an alarm go off five times a day and I wrote down what I was feeling in a note on my phone. A lot of my entries were “I’m not sure”. The practice showed me how often I have no connection to my feelings at all and prompted me to get to know them better.

Try using a feelings wheel or a feelings chart at least once a day to get used to checking in with yourself and putting a name on it.

Defining What You Want

We live in a society that has a very complicated relationship with wants. People often say we live in a consumerist society but we don’t often talk about what that’s done to us psychologically, to be so consumptive. There’s a lot of morality around them too that we internalize. We identify strongly with what we want. We define ourselves through our ambitions and our goals. But it means what we really want gets lost in the pursuit of shaping our desires to be acceptable or admirable. We ignore our desires that don’t fit with our narratives which is such a block to shadow work. How can you work on what you won’t let yourself be conscious of?

You have to understand that you and your desires are not one in the same. Just because you really want to enact violence on someone for what they’ve done doesn’t make you a bad person or a mean person or what have you. It’s a natural human desire. That doesn’t mean that’s it’s justified just that you are not bad for having those thought or desires. This extends to other things people don’t like admitting they want – finding other people more appealing than their partner, wanting someone who’s wronged them to suffer, wanting more for yourself even if it means someone else goes without – they’re all desires we have from time to time.

Practice writing what you want out on paper. Remind yourself you don’t have to act on it and that it’s better to be aware of it so doesn’t sneak into the driver’s seat. It’s important to break the idea that we’re owed what we want or that we have to act on what we want. Desires, much like feelings, come and go. But they’re important to be aware of while they’re here.

Taking Responsibility

I still am unsure of how to describe how to do this. It’s really distress tolerance at it’s core; learning to be okay with not being okay. Because where I see people going wrong with responsibility in shadow work is that they either explain everything away with context or they go it’s all my fault and it’s so terrible I can’t do anything about it.

Part of taking responsibility is being able to answer the question “What do I owe in this situation?” If your answer is always nothing, you’re wrong. We are social creatures, we’re only here because we evolved the intelligence to work closely and creatively with other members of our species. We do owe each other things in any interaction. It’s important to practice thinking about what those things are. Equally important is thinking through what you don’t owe as well.

Practice sitting with your mistakes when they happen and trying to think what’s owed in this situation. Shadow work depends on our ability to take responsibility for the roles we play in what keeps us stuck.

Pattern Recognition

I don’t know that I have much explicit advice for this category other than it’s incredibly helpful. Seeing your patterns is really key to zeroing in on automatic behaviors or thoughts. Pattern recognition is kind of like playing Minesweeper. It gets you a little closer to what you’re trying to uncover without having to step right in it and maintain yourself to be reflective.

Journaling can be really great for this. If you see yourself writing about the same actions or feelings or thoughts again and again and again. Going back through old conversations where you’re venting might give you some clues.

Whenever you find yourself frustrated you keep doing something, take note. When are you doing these things? What does it offer you? What does it protect you from?

We don’t do things repeatedly if they don’t serve us in some way which can be hard for us to admit.

Compassionate Problem Solving

So you’ve dug up these unpleasant truths about yourself, what’s a shadow worker to do? The only way forward is compassionate problem solving. Which is best summed of for me as working with yourself, not against yourself. I’m reminded of permaculture – the problem is the solution.

An example of this in my own life was ADHD. Once I finally realized what I was dealing with was ADHD, I spent several months ignoring it completely and being shocked when I couldn’t will myself to be “normal”. I felt a lot of shame. It was only when I started accepting where I was at and then going okay what can I do that things started to shift. “Okay, if I know I’m gonna forget my keys what can I do?” I put spare house keys and car keys in my car so when I inevitably forgot them somewhere I could call AAA and I’d be able to drive home. “Okay if I’m gonna forget my papers what can I do?” I made digital backup galore so I could access them and print them off at the last minute on campus. My life got so much better with the approach.

Wherever you’re at there are things you can do to make it better going forward and it’s important to get creative and stay reasonable. Getting triggered frequently? Make sure you have a cool down list of some kind on your phone. Too scared to grab groceries by yourself? Grab a buddy or order them and pick them up. Spending too much time in bed because you’re depressed as shit? Set a 5 minute timer and do one thing to make your life better. Literally all of these are personal examples.

There’s always something you can do. Small wins are still wins. Count them. There’s no need to be cruel to yourself while doing shadow work. Practice coming up with at least three different ways to respond to issues that you face. Even if you know a solution isn’t the one you’re gonna take, get used to putting out more than one “right” answer. In shadow work, there’s always more than one path.

Conclusion

I hope this is helpful. A bit rambling, but I think I could have used a post like this when I was starting out. Shadow work gets very individualized, very quickly, but I’ve yet to talk to anyone who wasn’t using at least a few of these in their personal shadow work journey. Hope these skills and how to practice them help!

If you’re feeling as if you’re harboring bad energy during your day, showering cleanses and refreshes your body’s auric field. Showering before going to work or out anywhere else can at least assist in releasing some bad energy you were holding onto all day.

Working through the Tarot: Page of Swords

So, what does it mean to be just beginning on our path to wisdom? Well, first look at how this page holds her sword. She gingerly clutches it in her hands and thrusts the blade upward. It does not look like she is preparing to wield it against another but it testing its weight in her hands. The tip is out of the frame, completely, point upwards, towards the objective clarity of the sky. She is not using it to attack so much as utilizing it as a tool to help on her path. She also seems quite isolated, though purposely so. She stands atop a hill, looking down at a larger scene. She has taken some distance to gain perspective. The presence of clouds in the card is also interesting. I am most interested in the ones by her head in front of her eyes, which connote a clarity of vision she was yet to attain. Before the mind can process anything, you must have “right view” as the Buddha taught in the eightfold path. Her taking a step back from the situation, then, demonstrates her ability to acknowledge her lack of clarity and that she knows the value of pondering and looking before she leaps.  Because, certainly, not-doing is not passive. Rather than a head dress or a hat, like the other pages, she wears a feather tucked into her hair that the wind blows backward so it puffs out into the air. This demonstrates the work of the intuition or the unconscious mind that the page is letting take place. She is not doing any active problem-solving but letting some deeper, inner processes take place. 

 The major pitfall of this card, however, is isolation, or detachment from the issue at hand. Is she using her search for objectivity as an excuse to disengage from her feelings or the feelings of others? Is she looking for a clear answer rather than involving herself with the messy complexity of this world? In a divinatory reading, I would ask the seeker if their pulling back from something is helping them gain perspective or an attempt to disengage from their life. I think her boots point to an important message. Their red hue symbolizes passion- that is what grounds her, keeps her balanced. She must be rooted in care and feeling for this life to truly gain the perspective she needs. 

Mercury retrograde begins on October 13th and ends on November 3rd

It’s time to slow down and re-evaluate your plans. Make sure to stay flexible because we might be experiencing unexpected changes and disruptions.

Try to be patient, not just with others, but with yourself as well! Many of us might feel frustrated and tense during the retrograde, so please make sure you are taking care of yourself. It’s okay to take some time off to rest.