#witch busted

My First Encounter:  I’m fairly sure I ran across some random blog on tumblr about 11:11 sometime in late 2014. By February 2015, I was obsessed. I carried a notebook and kept track of as many number sequences as I could, even while I was driving. *cringe*

What are angel numbers and where did they come from? They are the concept that angels, spirit guides, ascendant masters, and / or ancestors are using the vibrational frequencies that exist around us to communicate using numbers. The name was coined by a psychiatrist turned new age motivator turned evangelist, Doreen Virtue. 

In the late nineties, the licensed therapist-- with a ph D -- transitioned from family therapy and treating yo-yo dieting to chakras and communicating with angels. The transition spawned from an encounter where angels intervened in a violent car-theft attempt against Virtue. Her first book on angel numbers was published in 2005 and the book that gives us the coded meanings that we tend to google comes from “Angel Numbers 101”, which was published in 2008. She has over 50 published books on angel therapy and 10 different oracle decks in circulation. Well-versed in past-life regression, she also claimed that she was in service to Pythagoras (yes, THEE Pythagoras) in a past life, the inspiration for her work with angel numbers. In 2017, she went through another spiritual transition, this time becoming an evangelist christian and claiming that Jesus saved her from the hedonistic ways of the New Age Movement. She has since renounced all of her previous work. Well, sh** .... Now what?  Like this person said: “If the woman who coined the term ‘angel numbers’ no longer believes in her own work, does that make it invalid? Of course not. Just because someone denounces their work, doesn’t make it any less truthful or valid. She simply transferred her knowledge into the Christian community and has since used Christian vocabulary to describe the meaning of numbers.” 

(⚠️ I always link my sources, so if you do take a look at the blog post that the excerpt just above is from, please be warned that it is ripe with misinformation that I don’t have time to break down. ⚠️) The problem with the above statement is that it’s not really true. But don’t take it from me, listen to Doreen Virtue herself: “I really apologize for teaching about ‘calling on angels’. I was deceived by New Age teachings and by demons who were posing as angels. Not one person in the Bible calls upon angels. If God wants to send an angel to someone, he will send it. Calling on angels is dangerous because demons masquerade as angels (2 Corinthians 11:14)”.

They say you cannot kill what you did not create. Virtue is undeniably trying to kill a concept that she created. For me, that’s enough right there. Witchcraft is based on intent. A lot of the tools, associations, and methods we use have been passed down for hundreds, sometimes thousands, of years, creating massive intention through collective consciousness. Her denying this work kills its original intention. However, you can also use this argument in favor of angel numbers, by arguing that the work has risen above the author -- that angel number information has been taken up by the collective, therefore its meaning and power live on. There are still people out there loyal to her work with numbers, if not to her. You can check out that perspective from a fellow witch and blogger here. My take-away: I’m not following a code that was invented and then renounced in less than ten years by one person. You can chalk it up to collective consciousness having the upper hand, but as history and current events around the world have shown us, even collectively humans are easy to deceive.

I am, however, interested in Numerology itself, which is basically divination through numbers. And since we have a lot of evidence to support the theory that everything is math (shout out to Pythagoras and Da Vinci, among others), I still wholly support the concept of numerology, that I will research from it’s more ancient origins and move forward. Stay tuned for updates!