In the distance there is truth
Which ends like a knife.
The bridge we have laid
will always give us life.
We who cross
on a goat we ride,
full like fruits
In the red sea tide.
--Just Like Arcadia,
#HappyFriday friends!
#PsychicTV #FediCoven
Goat (and wolf) riding illustrations by #BernardZuber, 1926

Hi #Fedicoven, I'm working on my new "Monster Zine" and making it as some kind of offering to Loki. At least to the version of Loki that lives in my imaginary world, he has been my dreamworld spiritual guide for many years already, and has become a character of many of the stories I imagine and sometimes even write.

Today is 25.03.25. I find that "mirror dates" are a good time to begin work on something intended to turn your life around.

So, I might pop in from time to time after all as things get going. I appreciate your patience as I navigate all of this: there are a lot of things on my mind related to the way I'd like to live and the reality of how I should live right now given the choices available.

But enough of that for now. The first newsletter has been sent out to members, and I'd like to share it here as well for anyone interested to read.

"A Treatise on Ascendent Ritual"

This work is participatory. It is demanding of discipline, of belief, of preparation. It highlights shortcomings, shortcuts, and insecurity. The results you achieve are based on the effort you put in: in knowing thyself, in forging the thought patterns that work towards your will, in curating mindfulness and careful attentiveness. This is magick: this is what makes it real.

There is an industry, a very profitable one, that would like you to believe that magick just happens for a price. That if only you pay the right price, you can bypass the work of magick. They frame the inner work required as healing, but false healing: healing that doesn’t require you to look inward too deeply, healing that looks like lush palm trees and swimming pools and sound baths, healing that comes automatically from hearing the right frequency, taking the right substance, or buying the right clothing. There are practitioners that will take your money and tell you that all you need to do to manifest prosperity is to buy their book, their workshop, their jewelry, their incense, their candles. To outsource your power to them. Their will is not teaching or guidance, because they are the new priesthood: interpreting energy and doctrine for you in the ways that benefit them.

https://sigillosacro.com/this-kind-of-work-is-earned/

#dailyhandwriting 23, Are you a cat person or a dog person?

I am a familiar person, and adore it when kindred spirits transcend species designation, regardless of fur, scales, or feathers.

So, I've written a little ode to familiars instead.

Not visible in my end of the planet but:

HAPPY BLOOD MOON EVERYONE!

#fedicoven Q20 What are your thoughts on the ethics of love potions and spells

I'm really curious about #lovePotions in the historical context of power imbalances and women being disempowered at various periods through history. I even wonder if some "love potions" were poisons viewed through romantization of our modern era.

#fedicoven Q20 What are your thoughts on the ethics of love potions and spells?

I think people largely overestimate their influence when it comes to spellwork. Real, true love is under the purview of the gods, you can't make someone love you. Also, it's not like The Craft where you get an obsessive stalker, that's silly.

You can maybe initially get some to like you and be attracted to you, but you can do that without magick too. On first dates, most people dress up nice and act on their best behavior. It's manipulation, sure, but one that we consider acceptable in our culture. Everyone wants to put their best face forward and we all expect it.

But the thing is, that illusion has to fall and eventually, the spell is broken. Because in order for real love to happen, a person has to know the *real* you.

TLDR: there are no ethics because love spells don't actually work.

#fedicoven Q20 What are your thoughts on the ethics of love potions and spells?

I get requests for love potions this time of year and have to explain this doesn't work with the way I view love and even if it did, I would not create it. Love is cosmic. Meaning, you can illuminate and embrace, but you cannot force it. All I can do is aid in seeing what is already there. Like parting the clouds to show the stars. So, that is what I made:

https://lydiavvinters.com/2025/02/14/spellcraft-love-illumination-potion/

Thoughts On a Full Moon: https://cerridwenscottage.com/2025/02/13/thoughts-for-a-full-moon/
#Fedicoven #FullMoon

Community Tarot Reading for the Week of Feb. 10:
https://cerridwenscottage.com/2025/02/10/community-tarot-reading-for-the-week-of-february-10-2025/
#Tarot #TarotReading #Community
Uses the Cozy Witch Tarot and the Shadows of Light Oracle.
#Fedicoven

Hey #FediCoven let's normalise public #witchcraft

Every Friday, I do a #tarot reading in the bus on my way to work.
Today's spread was:
1: How can I honour my ancestors?
2: How can I support my present?
3: How can I support my work to improve the world for future generations?

#Imbolc is not a thing outside of Celtic traditions. This is a liminal time in the Wheel of the Year: new life is struggling against #chaos. During #Carnival , we let the demons from the dying year loose one last time. We channel them through masks. At the end of the Carnival, we sentence them to death by fire.
From their ashes, new life will be born again.

"Jean-Claude Schmitt shows that medieval idioms used several words to designate the “mask,” each one of them meaning both the object itself and the “supernatural powers” that were associated to the ritual and the artistic use of masks: larva, persona, masca in medieval Latin, or, in vulgar languages, “faulx visage,” “fol visage,” “sot visage” in French, or visor/ vizor in English. (...)
But in Southern France and maybe in Italy, the word had a meaning that is capital for our study: “witch.”

|The #Mask of the #Witch: from #Ritual to Carnival and Theatre|

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341063442_The_Mask_of_the_Witch_from_Ritual_to_Carnival_and_Theatre

Blessed #Imbolc to my friends here who celebrate. We are half way between the winter solstice and the Spring equinox. #FediCoven #candlemas

Is anyone else awaiting spring with the patience of a skittles-fuelled toddler?

---
Breathe.

Under Sol's dancer, adrift in the blue,
Touch the soil, with warmth renewed.
In Gaia's breath, bid winter's rout,
Wake, ye buds, 'tis time to sprout.

Let Aeolus' whispers the branches swing,
Hark! To the birds, as they begin to sing.
In Ver's embrace, bid frost take leave,
Breathe, O Earth, 'tis time to breathe.

#fedicoven
It's Friday, so here is another FediCoven question.
-----

Question 18

January 24, 2025:

Can you share the most profound experience you've had with witchcraft, where it genuinely affected your life significantly?

(How did this incident influence your continued practice and beliefs?)

------

All who are walking their path are welcome.

Any suggestion for tools worth a try for maintaining a digital grimoire/book of shadows, possibly not involving big shitty tech (Google, Microsoft and the likes)?

I've been fool enough to use Zoho Notebook so far and *of course* it is now paywalling previously free features and going down the enshittification route.

Send help.