#wearearadia

The New Aradia A Witch’s Handbook to Magical Resistance edited by Laura Tempest Zakroff 106 pages / September 2018 / 9781947544161   The New Aradia is a handbook is designed to serve as a collection of ideas to teach, share, inspire, empower, protect, and guide. Within its pages are sigils, spells, recipes, essays, invocations, rituals, and more, all gathered from experienced magical practitioners. At your fingertips is an arsenal of tools to aid you on your path.

With contributions by: Aidan Wachter, Amanda Bell, Annalun, Annwyn Avalon, Aradia the Rose, H. Byron Ballard, Casandra Johns, Christopher Penczak, Deborah Castellano, Devin Hunter, Gwendolyn Reece, Irina Xara, Irisanya Moon, Ivo Dominguez Jr., Jay Logan, Jenn Zahrt, Kelden, Laura Tempest Zakroff, Lisa Bland, Lyssa Heartsong, Mat Auryn, Misha Magdalene, Patti Wigington, Phoenix LeFae, Raye Schwarz, Stephen Pocock & Storm Faerywolf.

With every purchase of this book direct from the publisher, $1 will go to the Southern Poverty Law Center and $1 to Emily’s List.*

Order at: The New Aradia: A Witch’s Handbook to Magical Resistance – Revelore Press

Before I called myself “Witch” I was a strange girl with a penchant for the bizarre and spooky. Having been a seer and am empath all my life I was fascinated with the otherworldly, turning to the more well known of esoterica and occult to feed my fascination. When I was 9 I got my first tarot deck, and when I was 13 I found a ouija board in my stocking on Christmas morning.

There’s a lot of controversy around the topic of Ouija boards, or spirit boards. Some decry them completely, insisting that they’ll never bring anything but trouble, others swear by them as a means of contact with non-physical beings. Personally I believe that a spirit board is like any other means of contact: you’ll get what you’re putting out, consciously or subconsciously. Unfortunately, as a troubled newly-teen the energy I was putting out, whatever my intent, was confused and negative, a perfect target for anything that feeds off those lower vibrations.

It came through at first masquerading as the grandfather I’d never known, who passed away a few years before I was born. It wasn’t long before it became obvious that it was no dearly departed family member I was interacting with. Of course it lured me in at first with pleasantries and secrets, for weeks the contact seemed light and playful. Until it began spelling out crude and invasive comments and desires, things that made my skin crawl. When it began to manifest it was as a dark, creeping shadow, the sensation of something cold getting into bed beside me at night, and once a full body apparition of what looked like a young man with dark clothes and pallid skin, the whites of his eyes were black, and he was at least 8ft tall and menacing. It tormented me for months, it fed on my anguish and did it’s best to cause me as much fear and pain as it could. Nightmares kept me from sleeping, and I didn’t want a thing to do with anyone else, the sounds of my loved ones voices were grating and ugly to my ear. I was angry, and I was scared. I began scour the web for banishing spells and clearing rituals, trying each to no avail. The negative entity began mocking my attempts, getting bolder in its attacks.

One night, when poltergeist activity had made a mess of the room I used for my ouija sessions, I found myself at my breaking point. None of the advice I had found online or in books had helped, and I felt it was time to appeal to something closer to that unseen world. I poured out a circle of salt, and sat myself in the centre with my board. I was so tired and stretched so thin that tears were rolling down my cheeks as I called out for the help of something positive, someone greater than this darkness that had been following me. I could hear the entity knocking about the room, around my salt barrier, things were falling off of tables and floorboards were creaking with heavy footfalls. Then, suddenly, silence. My sob caught in my throat, and no fresh tears gathered in my eyes.

“Is someone there?” I asked, hands shaking on the planchette.

“Yes”

“What’s your name?”

“A-R-A-D-I-A”

I didn’t recognise it, and I wouldn’t until I saw it again a full three years later.

“Can you help me?”

“Yes.”

She proceeded to spell out a simple, three line incantation that I was to repeat that night when I was in bed, and the entity was sure to be hanging around, ready to continue its harassment. I thanked her profusely, sure, despite my past failures, that this would be the thing that saved me.

I felt her leave, she took the stillness of the room with her, but the knocking and footsteps were gone as well.

That night, when the being came back, rattling my furniture and running what felt like cold fingers over my skin, I shut my eyes right and repeated the incantation three times. The first time the rattling only got more intense, and my fear swelled, with the second I heard heavy breathing in my ear, angry and hot on my neck, but as I finished the third all activity stopped. More than that, the heavy blanket of darkness that had been weighing me down for moths had lifted. I felt a flutter of hope in my chest, and such relief passed over me that I cried myself to sleep. I dreamt only of bright, white light, no nightmares haunted me.

Years later, when I had realised my path and sought a deeper understanding of the occult and witchcraft, I came across the title of a book that brought that interaction with that helpful entity flooding back: Aradia: Gospel of the Witches.

I thought I should let you all know about the #WeAreAradia hashtag floating around social media.

Fight against oppression, fight against your oppressors, work your magick until those that need to be protected are. Fight for your equality, fight for you rights!

What is #WeAreAradia? As I wrote over here, #WeAreAradia says we don’t need a savior, or one voice to save us.  We need to save ourselves, we need to be the teachers.  We need to be the learners and the guides. We need to be the Witches.  It’s a call to stand up for your beliefs.  A message, a call to action to build and use your practices to protect and to empower everyone who needs it. I would like to also note that this is a call across traditions, genders, colors, creeds, ages, and abilities.  We can revel in and honor diversity – AND bring everyone up together.