The Crafts: Wixes, Spells, and the Weaponized Placebo Effect

I would do sense associations as well. Basicaly seconding @Lazarae s way of doing things.

 

Yeah, I think Lazarae's got the right idea. Makes sense, based on a lot of the divinity styles I've seen done.

I need to find something more... reliable then my pendulum? I can never tell if it's just telling me what I want to hear or actually the truth

 

I will put marks on these beads the day after the sun turns us all into ash on a rock. THEY ARE GORGEOUS AND I WILL DIE BEFORE HARMING MY HOARD.

The problem with finding associations is figuring out which is which, if that makes sense? I'm not particularly intuitive to that degree, there's only one meaning that's popped out at me (a set of black and pink beads that always seem to be at least two together have something to do with relationships).

I might do a couple of tarot draws for each bead, record the findings, and try to synthesize something out of that. Seems as helpful as anything.

Also @Les tried runes or tarot?

 

If you don't want to put marks on the beads, could you make a spread of runes or sigils or etc on a cloth or nice paper and toss the beads onto that?

Edit: WTF Autocorrect

 

Is anyone into numerology, someone ran my numbers or whatever once and I was going to google it but I forgot. And then the beads reminded me. I need to make a list of google things and add to it. I do decently with lists.

 

That'd probably thermal shock all your beads anyways.

#helping #casually wombats out of witch thread

 

I haven't tried Tarot due to cash issues, runes, I really haven't tried yet. Most of my questions are like yes/no.

 

That's a good idea! Definitely something to try. Such a cloth would make a great carrying bag too. Could be kind of hard to read on my bead, though, you'd need a very flat surface.

Ironically i feel like a star chart would be great for it even though I don't astrology for the life of me.

honestly, tarot reads just as well with "Get 78 index cards, write the names and maybe some meanings on them, shuffle." Could probably do pretty much the same with runes, or make a bunch out of ovenbake clay.

 

@Les You can try ogham staves maybe if there are money issues. Just find sticks and some way of getting the letters on the damned things. I used paint though most people sand and carve them. Alternatively collect some small rocks and paint the things on those. Put the letters on index cards like starcrossedsky said for tarot. PUT OGHAM ON ALL THINGS YOU HAVE EVER. I MAY BE BIASED IN MY METHODS OF DIVINATION.

I also really like animal divination though that is even more hit and miss than other methods I feel. Really for me personally it is mostly a gut based thing. Are the animals that I see normally giving me intense feels of some sort? If so I might want to think about this and what kind of bird they are and what exactly they are all doing. Hawks are kingly birds so depending and I have had very strong "yo follow me" vibes with them before. Which led me to Lugh related religious happy times because I am absolutely fucking crazy. Another time I ignored a bunch of very conspicuous crows that weirded me out and was attacked by a dog. The thing didn't bite me but god damn that was scary. I like to think of that as the Morrígan's hello for my first Samhain, as well as a message of "Actually pay attention and take this seriously, kid".

A similar thing that can be done cheaply and is based on asking questions is the frith. Basically get to your front door (or the back if you have a backyard and don't want people going why is that person looking outside???). Ask Bríghid for her help in answering your question (someone somewhere had an actual thing for this but sadly I can't recall it). Walk around three times in a circle sunwise. Then face the door, close your eyes, and walk towards it to open. Once the door is open you can open your eyes. Or for extra oomph you can stand on one leg and the hands over an eye. Like a kid playing at having a telescope. This is called crane stance and is associated with crane magic, which we sadly know next to nothing about. Anyway crane stancing it or otherwise take in everything that you see in front of you. Only that which is directly in your line of sight. Don't move around to find more things. Just look at what you can directly see. That is what the actual reading is going to be done off. I personally use a mixture of basic gut instinct and knowledge of various superstitions and omens of my two particular religious backgrounds for the reading. So corvids point to death or injury, cranes are a bad sign and are foul tempered but sacred, and so on.

I just really like omens.

 

Still brainstorming on my glass-bead-divination thing. Babbling under the spoiler.

Spoiler

Bizarrely I’ve been drawn to tying it to astrology, which isn’t usually my bag at all (as anyone who knows me already knows; I bitch constantly about the poor accuracy of my horoscope as a Capricorn). But the minute the idea was brought up of tossing the beads on a cloth to divine, my intuition was just YEAH. THIS IS IT. THIS IS THE GOOD SHIT and then veered hard right into astrology.

Slightly rambly specifics:

• The cloth is a starchart (possibly a full one but most likely just the zodiacs to start with - I don’t know if there are even any agreed-upon meanings for the non-zodiacs and would possibly have to start fresh for those)
• Chart would be laid so that querent’s sun sign is towards them (or directly away from the reader if the querent’s location is unknown) possibly unless querent asks for another sign to be used? eg venus sign for a love reading if they fell that’s more accurate
• Beads represent planets, and are tossed by the blind handful (so you might not have eg Jupiter at all in the reading, but you might also have Mars twice if two Mars-beads are there)

to consider:

• Alternate cloth with Tarot majors? With runes? With Homestuck aspects?
• Just laying out a bunch of tarot cards under the casting screen?
• What the fuck to do with retrogrades/if indicating retrogrades is relevant
• Eventually developing other meanings for beads? I have one that reads really strongly as The Tower, that’s not a planet.

Developing new divination methods is hard, guys.

 

*gracefully butts in*

Is this an okay thread to mention auras in? I used to be super into them as a tween (thanks to the books Girlwood and Chasing the Sky)(I think it was Chasing the Sky) and I spent a good year or more trying to train myself to see them and the only things I remember seeing with any mild certainty was an overlay of sorts in the shade of a tree, like, the pretty lacey leafy shadow and then I felt like I could see something else. And then at summer camp I tried on a friend and saw this pretty peachy color. Very close to her body. But she was wearing a coral striped shirt and I feel like maaaaybe that influenced my eyesight.

Anyone have any thoughts on them?

 

My thoughts are "potentially a real thing; most of the ways people tell you to read them involve bullshit and eye tricks." Like, I perceive what other people might call auras as sort of wings of the soul, and that's something I can describe meaningfully for people I know, sometimes even interpret to some degree. But traditional just-color auras do basically nothing for me, so.

 

Hm. I think that it isn't crazy unlikely that it could be one of those light frequencies that is generated by an energy, but its also something I want to believe in, and I'm rather good at making up things that sound plausible to myself, so XD I think the idea of them is super neat. Maybe I'll try again some time.

Although I apparently suck at seeing ghosts (have been in haunted places, saw not a thing even though two other people had, my mom has had an experience, my great grandma did) so maybe I'm just not good at seeing those kind of things in general XD

Edit: but to that end, there's been a number of times I've seen...movement? not out of the corner of my eye or anythings, but almost fluid looking movement. figure it's more energy stuff. or brain making things up because Want To Believe.

 

honestly it's completely possible for both to be true? I have the kind of presence that wards against spirits innately, I never seem to get bothered by them the way anyone else in this thread does. Like, I joke about it being because I'm salty as fuck as a personality trait, but there genuinely seems to be something. I've only had minor experiences a handful of times, only two reoccurring spirits in my life ever (and one of them is my dead cat), so like. I don't know if you saw the bit further back about Seebs making magic go haywire but I'm pretty sure that's me wrt spirits.

So it's entirely possible that you've also got something of the same thing going on, and it's not that you aren't sensitive to them but that there's nothing for you to sense because they're avoiding you.

 

well, I guess that could be a good thing! Or a boring thing. I'll go with good?

 

When I was younger (also during my otherkin phase), I thought I could see auras, but now, I think it's just synesthesia. I still use it in my practice, though, because why not.

Most of the stuff I do is based on visualisation with no material element, but I did do a few actual spells. Which mostly consisted of me grabbing some random shit, drawing sigils, and realizing the meaning and goals of the whole thing halfway through the ritual. I'm of the "weaponized placebo effect" opinion as well, which is why those spells tend to be personal work.

Also, I sometimes do offerings. Relevant title is relevant: I have an absurd amount of tea lights which I mentally charge with whatever kind of energy I want to give, and leave to burn in some place where I know some spirit is hanging around.

 

I haven't seen spirits either. I get bad feelings a lot but idk probably a lot of that is just overactive imagination, specially since of course it is more prone to occurring when I've been reading things I SHOULDN'T. Like some of the creepy Calgary Keys stuff someone linked to on the spooky stories thread. I HAVE TO GO OUT AND CLEAN THE HORSE FIELD OFF THIS EVENING, ALONE. I get a lot of the original meaning of the word Panic. If it is Pan, he's kind of a dick. Perhaps I should try offering to him, or just telling him to back the hell off haha. I HAVE got a lot more comfortable walking around since I started making respectful gestures and offerings (...dry dog kibble, which is what we take for dog snacks on walks because one of our dogs has a sensitive tummy). Which is great. Still a few places I avoid though.

 

hello, I am brand new to this thread and so I'm just letting people know that I am a witch, still figuring out whether I'm agnostic or whether I will continue to worship Brigid and Artemis (Brigid's an Irish goddess of poetry, healing, and smithcraft, for those who don't know. Artemis is a fairly commonly named goddess and I will assume people know who she is.) right now I've kind of stopped working spells and the like until I know which is going to happen.
the other reason I've stopped working spells and stuff is that I may have a chance to follow my Abenaki heritage, but I can't do that and be a witch, so until I know which one I'm picking...

as far as the current discussion goes, I've seen and heard spirits. I also have psychotic depression, though, so gods only know what's actual spirits and what's just that making shit up.
I am of the personal belief that I can see auras/energy, although I don't know if it's actually auras or just my psychotic symptoms again.
I have a lot of beliefs about energy beings and ghosts and planes of existence and shit, so that might come up at some point.

 

If you dont mind my asking, why can you not be witchy and follow abenaki practices? I know in america quite a few wixes incorporate various native practices into traditional european-style witchery, though its not a topic i personally know much about. Sorry if this question is super ignorant.

 

well, I mean, every group is different, but the Abenaki chief explained it to me like this:
there are two paths that every Abenaki person must pick between, and once you've chosen a path, you can't un-choose and you have to follow that path to its end. and you can't worship other gods while following that path, simply because of the chance that the two will conflict and also because it could interfere with the dreams and such you're supposed to get. if you're following another god who's sending you dreams and messages and such, then it's likely that's going to conflict/interfere with what you're supposed to do while following the path you're following.
so basically, it's just the risk of the two conflicting. I used to incorporate certain Abenaki practices into my witch stuff, but if I really want to follow one of the two paths, then I can't risk the two conflicting at any point and I'm not allowed to follow any other gods or spiritual practices that aren't Abenaki, if I really want to commit to one of the two paths.