Hello Occulties:
Soooo, I have a few articles on their way out, one is going to be a book review, there is a money spell en route..so, get excited for the 14 days of posts (which may technically be 14+ posts not on 14 different days…sorry about that – work really hella sucks in December.)
The following are things just so many people who write me need to stop doing:
1. Calling every practitioner of magic a “witch” and/or assuming “witch” isn’t an offensive word to several people.
There are a lot of words today that don’t mean what they once did. For example, if I say your party was a festive and gay event, I would no longer mean that it was decorative and cheery as much as I would PROBABLY be saying that it was both festive and also chock full of homosexuals. Gay no longer means what gay meant for centuries – now it almost exclusively is applied to people who sexually and romantically appreciate people of the same biological sex.
Or, if you see two people of color calling each other a bad n-word (it rhymes with bigger), you might not be as offended as you’d be if Princess Ginger McWhitey (that’s me in this context, spat out the same word. Sometimes certain types of insulting words can be used by people if they use it ironically, like you calling me Ginger McWhitey the soulless ginger is far more hilarious if you’re also a ginger.
Witch is sort of like both of the above. For example, it really DOES NOT mean what it once meant as “wise one” to most people. AND if you’re a practitioner of magic, calling someone else who practices magic a “witch” in an ironic and humorous sense (assuming you’re friends,) can be completely fine, whereas if some stranger calls you a witch, it’s a bit offensive, really. I realize some Wiccans want to reclaim the word and refer to each other as so, but I don’t call Muslims and Christians “Jewish” because they are all Abrahamic religions, and that would actually be more apt than calling all practitioners of spells “Witch.”
Witch has grown to mean a lot of ugly things in the modern world. You’re free to reclaim it for yourself if it makes you feel exciting and sexy or something. As for me, if you call me a witch, I think you were too afraid to call me bitch, or you are just really really bigoted against my spiritual beliefs (and ignorant, to boot,) and/or you think I’m a Satan-worshipping baby-killer. 
Or maybe it means you think I’m a Wiccan? I know a lot of Wiccans who don’t like the term witch, and a lot of neo-pagans who don’t like that term either, but I’m neither Neo-Pagan nor Wiccan (many practitioners aren’t,) so this is an inappropriate term to use even if not being used in the offensive manner.
2. Putting a “k” at the end of the word “magic.”
NO ONE put the k on “magic” to separate it from card tricks and illusions. A man named Aleister Crowley put a k on his brand of magic to separate what he did from work of the Golden Dawn. In fact, Crowley had magic and magick – and they were 2 types of magic which he separated by varying points.
Magic is an anthropological term – you’ll find it in totally real anthropology books and everything, and spelled right. You can spell it right. That k has been going out of style since the 1990’s…it’s not going to come back all retro just because Llewellyn publishers still uses it…and were the ones who widely promoted the lie that the k is to let all the people we pretend are too stupid to know the difference between magic and illusions are on to which one we’re discussing. If those people are so ignorant, you’re going to have to explain the k, too. Sooooo, let’s just start spelling like we all graduated first grade, OK? The leisure suit isn’t coming back, and that k isn’t coming back in style either. If you’re younger than 35 and still pinning it on something, it’s ridiculous. If you’re over 35? Well, I guess old bad habits die hard. 😉
3. Telling your practitioner (and/or yourself) that you’re “not obsessed.”
Please. I’m obsessed with normal things all of the time. 😛 2 months ago, I got obsessed with the color blue, and now I have like 5 blue outfits…or is it 7. I just wanted everything to be colored blue. Before that it was orange, then purple, and I’ve always been into red…so, I mean, we’re all “into” something and it can (and often does,) border on obsession. There’s a reason that I can tell you so much about the French Bourbon dynasty…it’s because I got obsessed with it and read everything I could to the point that I would have needed to learn French to learn more.
How often, every day, do you think about pigs wearing human outfits? I mean literally a hog dressed in a suit and tie. Not how many times did you think about it yesterday? Was it zero times? OK. How many times did you think about anything relating to the situation you’re spellcasting on yesterday? Now, how many times did you think about your car when you weren’t driving it? How many times did you think about cleaning the floor? How many times did you think about the first Indiana Jones movie (Raiders of the Lost Ark)?
See where I’m going here? All sorts of things you NEED to think about you probably think on less than you think about your situation you’re spellcasting on. So, SHUT THE FUCK UP (AND/OR STOP TYPING) ABOUT NOT BEING OBSESSED. Why? You’re obsessed.
Every time someone lies to me about being obsessed, I hurl them to the back of the line for being delusional (and because I only have so much patience with which to deal with the delusional,) about their own situation.
So, for what it’s worth, I get it. You ARE obsessed, but is it to an unhealthy degree? If you’re lying to yourself about being obsessed, it probably is. If you justify your obsession to yourself, you’re definitely past a point where it’s healthy (for example: I’m only obsessing because I have only 25 years more left to live – or I assume that’s the minimum, – and it’s NOT ENOUGH TIME!!!!!) If, however, the idea crosses your mind in passing a few times a day? That might not even click on the obsession scale. Do you think more on what you’re going to make yourself for dinner than you do on your spellwork? Then you’re probably doing just fine, nothing to worry about. 😉
4. Attempting to micromanage any situation via spellwork.
This is a fictuituous recreation of something I see in my inbox daily:
“Hey Cat, this Zebadiah. So, I was just wondering, you know, Hermoine and I have totally been getting along OK and all, but like, last night she totes didn’t want to cuddle and she was like ‘Oh Zeb, I have a headache,’ and I totally think it’s because like, she sort of hangs with this girl, Euphingea, (Effy for short,) and like, Effy doesn’t like me much. Effy is still freaked out I think because she saw me and Hermoine like totally not getting along at Jimbo’s Halloween party, and she always tells my girl that she doesn’t need to put up with a guy who might have like 6 beers in 3 hours. While Effy really hasn’t said anything I KNOW OF to my girl since like the Halloween party, I just don’t want to take any chances. I mean, maybe it’s Hermoine’s job that’s stressing her out, and I think it’s like a week before her periods, so she, like, gets emotional sometimes and doesn’t want to cuddle, but seriously, let’s get to work on Effy. While we’re at it, let’s totes make Hermoine less stressed about her job, and…”
Wow. Do you think Zeb chooses his girlfriend’s outfits out every morning, tells her what make up to wear, what she can find funny, what foods she likes… I mean…fawwwwwwwk!
Zeb, LET GO, brother!
I understand wanting to make sure your spell has worked and that it has some supportive work going if you’re unsure if the result is tenuous. HOWEVER, controlling every element of the problem isn’t going to actually help – it makes manifestation and continued positive results more difficult to achieve.
Not only are you being obsessively controlling (obsession is bad, m’kay?) you’re also constantly pulling the situation back psychically to interfere with it. Visually speaking, this is a person who lets a bowling ball roll down the lane, then runs beside it gently tapping it to keep it centered…thing is, by the time it reaches the pins (manifestation) it’s been slowed too much by the person who won’t stop interfering.
Let’s go back to our example. Perhaps “Effy” isn’t really against Zeb. Maybe she had something negative to say that once, but know she’s encouraging her friend. If he works to remove Effy from his girlfriend’s life, he’s doing himself a disservice. Remember – the spells are cast to create a desired end – constantly interfering to micromanage how this comes about is NOT often going to speed results or make things easier to manifest. At some point you WILL need to let the spell go and do it’s work.
5. Defending stupid/self-defeating decisions/behaviors to yourself.
The other day (and this will seem off-hand, but allow me to go on,) I was unfortunately on that really shitty site that pretends to be worthy of a news-source, aka The Huffington Post (my IQ drops several points every time I read an article on there, but I recover in a few hours/days,) and I saw a woman saying “Take pictures of yourself now, instead of saying you’re too fat to be in pictures, because that mythical time you’ll be thin again will probably never come.”
What? So, you’re not advocating anyone try to lose weight, you’re assuring them, “Hey, stay fat, because I know you won’t ever work to lose weight or look good again, and accept that you hate how you look and what it does to your self-esteem.” And yeah, unfortunately that was the context of the article.
For 95% of overweight people, losing weight is not impossible nor is it some unicorn you’ll never catch. It does require exercise and diet which isn’t fun, but it is possible. The author showed a picture of herself. If she ate right and exercised for a year, she’d probably have a model’s figure – she was “big” but not absurdly so. Unfortunately taking 30 minutes to sweat at least five days a week and not eating as many cookies as she does right now was apparently a HUGE PROBLEM for her. Now, let’s ask ourselves….if the same woman was told she needs to watch a 30 minute program (sitting on her butt,) five nights a week, plus she has to eat an extra meal five times a week and that THIS would help her lose, let’s say, thirty pounds, do you think that would have been too hard for her to handle? Would that have been a mythical time in her life because it was too hard for her to schedule? Nope. But the opposite? NO, she can’t do that! It’s a mythical unicorn outcome! Thirty minutes DOING SOMETHING!? That’s totally too much to ask – even if she can make that time for the TV, she can’t make that time for anything else! NOT eating too much! TOO MUCH TO ASK! She CAN eat too much, but eating less is not OK.
So, while I embrace the idea that we should be with the ones we love (in photos/not in photos) regardless of temporary physical appearance (hey, maybe you ingested too much holiday cheer, maybe you couldn’t miss the Worldwide Bratwurst Eat-off, or maybe you just got a bad haircut) and that we should enjoy life to the fullest even when we’re insecure about what we look like, I also embrace the idea that if you don’t like something about yourself and you can CHANGE IT, then you should CHANGE IT.
How is it any different when you defend a stupid action with “I panicked, so it’s OK,” or “I have a broken heart, so it’s OK,” or “I like to drink until I say really shitty things to people, but it was just the alcohol talking, so it’s OK,” or “I was just really on the edge about work, so screaming ‘fuck you, you piece of shit,’ at my reconciliation target for a half an hour was totes OK.” No. No, none of it is OK. Do not defend your bad behaviors, your laziness, your refusal to change things you can change – maybe the action is in the past, but your ability to change the future STILL EXISTS and it starts with you changing the bad actions and behaviors that brought you to where you are now. There is no defense for what you’re doing, you’re merely justifying those behaviors/actions to yourself in an attempt to encourage yourself to stay where you are – a place you claim makes you unhappy – rather than to work at getting what you want. Stop that. If you can change something about you that you don’t like – if you can change something about your life that you don’t like, – start TODAY and RIGHT NOW about changing it. I wrote this nifty article on the value of choices…start there.
Disengaging from stupid decisions and behaviors IS RARELY EASY, and can be an addiction to stay in the cycle we feel trapped within. You WILL have to make a step to change your behavior or to stop that little self-defeating voice that says “accept that we can’t change this” but you can do it. Maybe you don’t want to exert the effort, but if you want change, you are required to make an effort…which is something that scares a lot of people. It’s why we convince ourselves to stay where we are (it’s comfortable,) rather than break away from that to change our lives for the better.
Changing your life with spells doesn’t mean it’s effortless – you still need to use effort. You still need to check your own behaviors and what caused you to get to the place you are now that you don’t like. The longer you defend self-destructive/self-defeating/stupid actions/decisions/behaviors, the longer you will persist in a place you do not want to be.
6. Worrying/scaring yourself/etc.
Since I have discussed this way too often, I won’t bother going over it AGAIN.
7. Mixing paradigms like a neophyte.
Ever seen this? “Hi, My name is Bunny Starfucker, and I’m a Gypsy Voodoo Wiccan Starchild Hermetic Gnostic Pagan priestess of Greek Santeria!” or similar.
OK, so that doesn’t exist but I’m sure you have seen someone saying shit like that. You want to know what I, your dear friend Cat, is?
Hi, I’m Cat. I’m trained in Hoodoo, which I consider my area of expertise in the occult world, specifically more with a NorthEastern flavor, which some people have told me is similar to Pow-wow, but I’ve definitely learned from SouthEastern, Southwestern, South American, and European Catholic sources. My secondary study is Hermetics with a focus on conjure.
I also have education in varying magical platforms (from minimal to extensive, depending on the paradigm,) but do not profess to be a priestess of 10 traditions, because that would be utter fucking bullshit.
Sooooo, if you’re a “Hoodoo Wiccan Gypsy Fairy Dragon Goetia Scarlet Maiden of Santeria” you’re probably a whole lot of nothing. 😉 It’s sort of like taking every single bit of food in a refrigerator and just mushing it together and assuming it will fuse into a super food instead of a disgusting, inedible bunch of shit.
I’m not saying that traditions can’t find fusion, because they can, but it takes a MASTER or an ADEPT to do this fusion…some dabbling assclown who calls burning candles “tons of experience” (setting lights is namby-pamby beginner stuff, guys and gals,) someone who has to constantly refer to books as a reference because they haven’t reached the point where they can work on their own INTERNAL SET OF KNOWLEDGE (that’s going to take years, and it’s an earned thing,) is not going to be the person doing any intelligent fusing. People who toss Erzulie and Oshun into the same pot are not actually doing anything brilliant…you can’t just mix and match cuz you “felt like it.” There is a logic, and there is working intelligently, and until you get to the ADEPT STAGE you should not be tossing around all sorts of cultures and paradigms because you’ll probably just hurt yourself (or accomplish jack shit.) It’s sort of like me building a house out of Play-doh AND cement because Play-doh is kind of like cement, right? Derp.
8. Harassing or being rude to disincarnate beings.
I will never really understand why people (generally drunk people, which lends at least a bit of insight) find it so entertaining and wise to harass the dead, or -even worse- the NEVER INCARNATE (that means this being was never human or in a physical body,) but then are SO SHOCKED when something starts fucking with them right back.
“But Cat!” you say, “So I drank a whole liter of scotch, and peed on a grave and then danced in my pee, and called the dead person beneath me a bunch of really bad things like a goat-fucking crack-whore who liked to bathe in the blood of dead chipmunks, and then challenged that dead person to make themselves known since they were obviously a big pile of shit. I mean, it’s not like they did anything when I was there! I just wanted a reaction. And sure, weird fires have started breaking out in my home, some scratching noises in the wall, and my kid has a bite mark on their ass from no known source. It can’t be my bad behavior causing that!”
O, rly. *rolls eyes*
See, I think you deserve everything you get if you disrespect the disincarnate like that.
More realistically, it goes something like this: “So me and a bunch of friends were trying to contact (named spirit/not named spirit) and nothing was happening, right? So my other friend was like ‘I don’t even think this is real. Nothing is happening. It’s bullshit that this/these (spirit/s) can even do anything anyhow.’ So we all went home and now weird shit is happening at so and so’s house, and…”
Yeah, again, why are you trying to contact this or any spirit? Please tell me you have a reason for this other than you’re bored. If you do have a real reason to contact the dead or never incarnate, you might EDUCATE YOURSELF on how this is done…suchas The Art of Calling Spirits into Crystals, and so forth…not just fucking with the disincarnate because you’re bored.
If you mess around and act churlish to those lacking a body out of boredom you are no better than someone who goes to, say, a maternity ward or a coma ward or an old person’s home, and starts harassing the patients, then cries when something bad happens. These beings can ignore you (just like maybe a coma patient isn’t responding,) or they might just decide you’re awful, and come after you (imagine someone waking up from a coma to beat the shit out of you and make a hat out of your ass-cheeks for waking them up.)
9. Reusing name papers.
The vast majority of the time, you’re supposed to actually deploy these someplace. I’m sure there is some exception somewhere to some rule, but let’s just say it’s a small exception. If you’re not deploying your name paper and reusing it, there’s a 999 chance out of 1000 that you’re doing it wrong. Stop asking me if it’s OK to reuse them. Do you reuse toilet paper? Ugh, I shouldn’t ask. I bet some of you do. 😛
10. Attempting to get free psychic questions answered (for example “I just wanna know, is s/he coming back – tell me and I’ll buy a reading!”)
When anyone has been a professional reader for longer than 2 days in a row, they’ve heard every trick in the book. Stop trying to do this because all it means is you’re a cheap, freebie abusing asshole and a terrible person for even attempting to get a free reading question done.
I do hope this has been educational, my dearies. Back tomorrow with some goodies! 🙂
~Cat
All the above is copyright OriginalNinjaCat.com and cannot be used without my express written permission.
Cat’s Rants: Confessions of an Occult Mastermind 