Now, I know that there is a mundane cause. I am perfectly fine with bringing up any mundane causes. Even though I physically clean the jar after emptying its contents, this isn't a sterile environment and dust or hair was still able to get into the jar. The salt and the essential oil attached itself to the dust. When the jar was shaken, the dust swirled with everything attached to it, giving the appearance of a, rather unpleasant looking, snow globe!

There are two ways to look at it in a way that encompasses the main aspects:

Dust/Dirt got in the jar

The jar did its job and absorbed any negativity that tried to latch itself onto us.

Seeking a mundane cause can allow us to remain grounded. It allows us to keep one foot in the physical plane while we search for deeper meanings on the spiritual planes. Looking at things from the mundane side first can help keep many from possibly going into a psychosis.

The magic side of things tell a different story.

Everyone in my house interacts with the outside world at various points of the day throughout various points of the week. Each outside excursion, while we wish would only bring positive feelings into our lives, have a tendency to bring about, at minimum, one negative interaction. This could be from something face to face, due to traffic, or some other cause. While we could chalk this up to Negativity Bias, we have all experienced a time in our lives where one bad interaction stayed with us through the rest of our day. These negative experiences add up and can put a damper on a whole day. I did not want to let these feelings, these energies, enter the house and fester, causing us to feel morose or other negative feelings. Those feelings, those vibrations, are absorbed by the cleansing jar. When keeping the magic side in mind, it makes sense to see the debris swirling as physical proof that the jar is doing what it is supposed to. It acts as physical proof that "it isn't all in my head".

That just sounds like Unverified Personal Gnosis, with extra steps.

And you wouldn't be wrong for thinking that! The magical side is, absolutely, UPG. Until the other members in this house feel or experience it the same way I do, it is UPG. It just happens to be one that has a physical aspect to it. It also happens to be a spell that harms no one and is barely larger than a random nicknack on a shelf.

So...what does it all mean? There has to be a bigger picture. What's the bigger purpose?

What it means: When a spell is working, you will see signs of it. Many of them will have physical signs that they are working, though they may not show as you had expected. It is best, however, to rule out any mundane reasons why something is happening (for example, why a candle melts weird could be due to a manufacturing flaw) before seeking metaphysical/spiritual signs.

What's the bigger picture? What's the bigger purpose: To develope stronger abilities to recognize the difference between mundane reasons and spiritual/metaphysical causes. Not only that, it can help solidify your experiences in more than just a UPG way. The only way to truly learn is to experience things firsthand.

So, let's look at a working spell the same way we would the scientific method:

Observation: What you want/Why you are creating the spell.

Question: What the spell is meant to do

Research: Create/write the spell/ritual you plant to cast

Hypothesis: How you want the spell to show it has manifested

Experiment: Cast the spell

Analyze Data: Let the spell do its thing and reflect on how things are moving in regards to your spell

Conclusion: Did the spell work or should you recast/try a different method?

Steps 6 and 7 are the areas that most people seem to have the hardest time with, because these two steps usually require patience in order to fully observe results. These final steps are where you are going to truly see your spell in action. Take note of how things seem to be evolving but let them do their thing without interference. Reflect on what would be occurring naturally without your assistance and what could only come from the spell.

Sometimes, a spell requires more introspection to see if it is working.

Ingredients:

Ethically Sourced Shell(s) - Mine came from a meal I ate. I cleaned and resourced the shells. If you are trying to find ones for use in nature, please double check foraging laws and the like in the area. Shells help represent the element of water, finances/abundancy

Rice - Representing abundance.

Salt - Representing a cleanse allowing what we need to come to us.

Pearl Beads - Again, I am pretty sure that mine are fake. I could be wrong. Either way, they are being used. They are being used as a representation of beauty, finances, opulence, prosperity.

Rose Quartz Point - Representing bring what is needed to us; beauty; self

Aventurine - representing finances; abundance

It started in the wee hours of the morning when I felt something putting pressure on the bed; it, also, touched my head. It wasn't either of the cats and my husband was on a different floor of the house.

I tried to write it off so I could fall back asleep.

Saturday morning, I kept feeling like something was trying to peer around my doorway at me when I was getting ready. I did so many double takes before closing the door more I thought I'd get whiplash.

I smoke cleansed the space as I got ready and prepared a fluorite "flask" necklace with some Hekate oil used as a protection oil.

The rest of the day, and the next day, I didn't feel this weight or anxiety like I had on Saturday.

Today, I am thinking about it more. I think I need to do another cleansing. A better one. This will focus on myself, my soul.

I'll feed my property wards. Smoke cleanse my dragons' homes. Maybe add another crystal representing fire to their area on my altar.

During the time this play's events take place, 1690s, the colony of Salem, Massachusetts was following the Puritan religion. They were very strict in their practices, holding the 10 Commandments in higher regard than any rule of man.

Not only did they want their religion to be pure, members of the church needed to be pure, too. They needed to be pure in character. The men needed to be hard working; needed to be protectors, leaders. Women needed to be subservient to the men, rear the children. They needed to uphold the message that man was created in God's image. They needed to follow what their husbands or fathers commanded; they needed to follow the 10 Commandments. Their thoughts, their wants weren't important.

Upholding the greater good was better for the "health" of the colony.

Now, luckily, the Puritans frowned upon all forms of adultery. If a woman was found guilty of adultery, the man she cheated with would also be punished and shamed. They were serious when it came to how they wanted people to live their lives (sound familiar?). However, if the woman was unmarried and found to have been "impure" before marrying, she would be shunned by the community and the man would, maybe, be fined (again, sound familiar?).

♤♡◇♧

Flash forward to 1950s America. The Red Scare, McCarthyism, has taken hold. Senator McCarthy launches probes into the Government to see how Communism has infiltrated the system. Being branded branded a communist was like being branded with a giant, red "C". It is its own form of scarlet letter.

Being called a communist was enough to be completely blacklisted by society. People lost their jobs and, due to the mark, became unhireable. People lost their livelihoods. No one wanted to speak against those pointing fingers, specifically Senator Joe McCarthy, himself, in fear of retaliation.

That same type of scarlet letter, in regards to infidelity, was enough to ostracize women. While not truly branded as property, women in America were unable to have any sort of financial control. Many married to get out of their parents' homes in the guise of love. If she realizes that they were never truly in love, she couldn't just leave the way she could now. If she was unfaithful to her husband, she was the one who would have her character ruined. Meanwhile, her husband would have been encouraged to have affairs. This could also be said about women who had premarital sex. She would be seen as "used goods" while he would be praised for "getting practice in". Many men had multiple families during this time.

♤♡◇♧

Bonus Story 1: I was introduced to the movie version of this before anything else; the version I still love with Winona Ryder came out in 1996. I probably watched it in 1997 or 1998. I would have been 6 or 7 years old. It left an impression because, on the surface, it was about witchcraft and the dangers of being found to have been using it by the public.

At those ages, I was actively dabbling in what I now know to be forms of folk magic. Was the lasting impression that I would need to hide what I believed as I got older? It sure would make sense, wouldn't it?

Bonus Story 2: I read this for the first time between the ages of 15-17, I'm thinking closer to 16... Junior Year High School English class. Miss McConnell's class... anyway.

That was when it was connected to McCarthyism. We didn't really talk about how it could be an allegory about slut shaming.

♤♡◇♧

And here we are: common/modern times. The year is 2026 CE, and yet we still treat women or feminine presenting people as lesser in society, in relationships. We still treat people poorly for acting on their human, animal, mammalian impulses.

Women are constantly judged for their "body count" while men are praised. Women are made to feel ashamed for being comfortable in their own bodies and expressing that comfortability using their clothes. Too baggy = hiding something; too tight or revealing = slut, promiscuous. Women are constantly being judged for what they do, who they do it with, how they appear when doing it.

♤♡◇♧

So what does this all mean?

It means that while times have changed drastically in many ways since 1690s America, things have remained the same.

Today's little bit of change was updating the cover to my "magic book".

More pages will be removed, changed, and altered as I go through my book.