Cat’s Rants: Confessions of an Occult Mastermind

Everything you ever wanted to know about Hoodoo, Rootwork, or the Occult! The internet’s longest running occult blog, established 2004

  • Hey Occulties,

    Let's get going with another round of Questions You've Asked Me. I'm starting with a repeat, but it's a really important repeat. ;) 

    Q: What are the biggest issues you witness among your clients/readers most often when using love/reconciliation magic?

    I did a video of this last year, but first and foremost, it is that people continue to engage in the toxic and abusive behaviors that chased off the person they want back in the first place. Nagging, arguing, jealousy, other behaviors borne of insecurity, being short sighted, verbally abusive, threatening them, threatening yourself, creating fake scenarios in your head and getting angry, stalking, manipulation, being controlling, not being accountable, being too clingy, not being clingy enough, lying….I mean, we all are at least a bit toxic, but if you want a relationship (any relationship!) to work, the best thing you can do is work on your own toxic behaviors and better yourself. A spell will not make someone overlook the continued bad behavior in the long run. So work on yourself while the spell works for you!

    Then there is the fact that people want overnight results. It happens, but frankly speaking to you all, it is wrong to assume that it will or that someone promising you such things is on the level. Spiritual work is a bit like medicine. Sometimes "treatment" (so improvement via the spell manifesting,) has to take weeks or even a few months. While the whining and bitching (if you do it frequently,) is chasing your worker off (there's literally 0 wrong with a spell that isn't a week old not having results yet,) it is also a huge red flag that YOU are a big reason your spell is taking so long to manifest. You have lust for results. So, not only do we almost certainly have a complex and difficult issue to tackle, one that didn't develop overnight or over a day or two, but you're slowing manifestation and blaming the wrong party. Trust me, I wish this wasn't how this worked – I've ruined and delayed my own work for myself having gotten lust for results, (annoyed a few friends like certain clients have annoyed me, too, haha,) and it blows – because if it were all the responsibility of the worker casting the spell, then my job (and by extension my peers' jobs,) would be so much easier. Instead, with certain people it feels like I have to drag them kicking and screaming to the place in life they paid me to get them. If you RELAX, and quit ruminating on the problem and stalking the target and overthinking, not only will you feel better (because you are upsetting yourself,) you will also get faster results! We just recently discussed lust for results so I'll leave it at what I said here, but know that FAST RESULTS ARE OFTEN SHORT-LIVED RESULTS…and that means you really shouldn't stress if it takes a few weeks anyhow. It's probably for your benefit!

    There's also the people who don't actually love the person they think they do. See, my mom always said you have to love someone "warts and all." She meant that you love the best parts and the worst parts and all in between. When you come to me and say "Well, I love (insert name) but s/he laughs stupid, and we don't agree on politics so I want to change that, and s/he is really into a few things I find so boring I want to chew my arm off when s/he starts talking, and also I wish s/he was smarter, and I don't really like her/his sense of humor…" etc etc – then you are telling me THAT YOU DO NOT LOVE THIS PERSON. Remember kids, NEVER SEEK TO CHANGE THE PERSON YOU ARE WITH BECAUSE YOU WILL FAIL, instead if you don't love all of them, you are just infatuated with your idea of them, and not them at all. And I get it – people get bad habits like addictions, or they are bad with money, or any number of faults that we'd all like them not to have. But you leave them how you get them, so if they cheated to be with you, they'll cheat on you religiously.  Don't like that? Don't help them cheat on their partner. You love someone but they drink too much and you hate drinking. Don't like that? Well, then you need to find someone who doesn't like alcohol like you or you need to accept that they are a drunk and love them despite that, and if you can't, then you move on. So when you come to me telling me you love someone except not large parts of their personality, then you do not love them at all. Chasing them and bringing them to you again and again with magic will help no one, and the relationship will ultimately fail. 

    Stop giving your perceived rivals headspace too. You are empowering them, keeping them in the picture, and causing yourself issues. That's easier said than done, of course, but unless this person is actively antagonizing you, or creating issues with you, then the faster you put them in your past and out of your head, the faster their influence will cycle out of the situation and into the past. 

    And lastly… NO ONE wants you drag up the past and your feelings when things are knitting back together. No one. So if you get contact with your ex, and have to immediately discuss the past or your feelings, past arguments, or the former relationship, don't be surprised when they take off pretty fast. Instead, you let the relationship start healing,  and wait until that ex brings up the past to talk to them about it. I promise you, you'll get your opportunity. 

    Q: What do I do if St Expedite doesn't come through? Do I eat the poundcake I got in my freezer and assume he hates me?

    A: Eat the poundcake if you want. Don't assume he hates you. The answer to some prayers is no. It sucks but you can always try asking another saint or another spirit for help. 

    Q: Why did you ask me what (ingredient) was for in my spell when I asked you if a spell I wrote was any good?

    A: Because it made no sense to me. I can tell you the exact reason anything exists in any spell I wrote. I know exactly what it's function is, and it has zero to do with "i saw it in another spell" being my only justification. So if you don't know why you are using bay laurel leaves, and it makes no sense for you to do so with your reported aim  for the spell in mind, and I'm reviewing this new spell you wrote with my decades of study and practice bringing up no fathomable reason for it to exist in your spell, I will ask what you meant the ingredient to do. If you don't have an answer (usually many people don't know what the ingredient does and cuffed it from another spell,) or your answer is "just because," you need to go back to the drawing board.

    That's okay! You need to start somewhere, but you asked me to critique it or help you, and if you can't give me a sensible reason for that ingredient…well, it's a bit like misusing a word or term you recently heard or read. If you don't know what it means or does, it's the very duty you enlisted me for to tell you that doesn't make sense and doesn't belong there. 

    Q: How do I remove a curse?

    A: That has a lot to do with if you are cursed, when you were cursed, what methods were used…several factors. So you are basically asking me something as vague as "what do I do if I don't feel well," with no other information. If you can tell me why you think you're cursed, what the symptoms are, who you believe cursed you (if known,) and why, as well as when you believe it started, then feel free to contact me and I can suggest something to help. 

    In the meanwhile, look for items hidden in your home, do not take any physical item from the suspected antagonist, and do not give them anything of yours. If you are not a public figure, try to keep any images of yourself blocked from the suspected antagonist on your socials. Add hyssop, rue, and salt to a hot bath, and submerge yourself, then stand up and wash DOWN (head to feet,) saying the 23rd Psalm ("The Lord is my Shepard,") to wash off any active curse energies. 

    Q: How do I know if Santa Muerte will work with me?

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    A: Start by asking her! You might try prayer, meditation, or a reading! I've found if she's approached respectfully, she generally will work with you, HOWEVER if you get no feedback from her, you might wait and try asking her assistance on another issue. If you get a bad feeling, a feeling of trepidation or worry, or any seemingly negative sign, do not work with her. She is a very helpful spirit but…she can be picky sometimes, even towards aims her devotees ask her assistance on. 

    I recommend your first working be using the Santa Muerte novena. This can be found online here. Once you have done the novena, you will be responsible for offering her a candle once a week for the rest of your life (or until you don't want her help on that issue,and she can rescind her help much like Saint Expedite.)

    Keep in mind, she may not help you against another devotee of hers – and the story I heard is she is a skeleton because she immolated herself after finding out her husband was having an affair, so she can be biased against women who try to take another woman's man. 

    Q: Could I literally use anything from the body of my target as a witness sample (a link to them)? Like what about old baby teeth or a scab!? 

    A: I have questions where you're getting someone's baby teeth (or if you have access to such a thing, if your kids are alright, heh,) but yes, you can use anything. If your target was a leper and their nose fell off, and you somehow managed to grab it, you could use that, though I'd be kind of careful about touching anything which might carry pathogens. 

    There are a few historical spells that I've read that even use scrapings from the foot – like scraping off a callous. 

    Now keep in mind, each part is going to be more useful for some ends than others. For example, a used toothbrush can be used to effect communication quite well, and it's full of dead skin and spit (which is why you change your toothbrush often, because that's gross but true.) An old worn shoe from the target can be used to make them move somewhere or to draw them to come back. Notice I DID NOT say that you needed to get their tongue or a toe. 😉 If it's clothing make sure it's unwashed and that they are the only wearer of the item. Hopefully no one is sharing toothbrushes, but that, too. 

    It's easier to get a strong biological witness sample than getting most people's baby teeth (I really don't want to know, but the original asker DID say baby teeth, haha,) and you may even find you have to handle something far less icky than a discarded scab. That said, even these unique choices and…yeah, body parts and things the body sheds are all usable. HOWEVER, please make sure you legally obtain these items, and please don't physically assault anyone to get a body part of them that you are using for spellwork. Obviously, we shed baby teeth and scabs, but with this question, I feel compelled to say do not assault any target to get these items, please and thank you. 

    Q: Why do my get a job spells keep failing?! I'm qualified for the job, and have years of experience in the field I'm applying in. I should be a candidate that anyone would want!

    A: At this writing (June 2025,) the economy is sliding right into the toilet from what I can tell, which is a factor we do need to consider, and without defining the person asking's field (in which there are jobs,) so as to help everyone, we also need to consider the industry you want a job in. When I was a little girl, travel agents were a huge necessity if you wanted to travel, and now I'm not even sure that's still a thing, for example, so if you are looking for a job which is disappearing or losing relevance, you may find that you are seeking something a bit like a unicorn or other fantasy creature. My parents still remember having a guy who delivered milk to their homes (a milk man!) and I don't think that's a thing anymore either, ha ha. 

    Now, I'm going to assume that you don't want to be a milk man or travel agent, and that you wanted a job you're qualified for that is still a kind of job that has relevance today. And for the sake of argument, let's say it has pretty good availability of jobs, and no hiring freeze.

    You know my first degree was in graphic design. This was still a booming industry until about 6 months to a year before I graduated. *sigh* When I did graduate, there were still some jobs, definitely, and I did some freelance work as a graphic designer for maybe a decade after I did graduate, but for someone who was one of the top design students in my class, it was pretty bleak and I DEFINITELY kept trying to do job spells to land a career in my chosen field. I'd get some freelance work, and it would taper off. 😛 Of course my classmates also were not getting jobs as designers, which probably was a big clue…but when I did this job work, other opportunities for skilled work (which I was skilled at,) kept popping up. It quickly became clear that the Universe had other plans for me, and those plans did not entail me becoming a famous artist who designed logos and ads.

    My point is maybe you're looking in the wrong field. Is the universe pushing you in another direction and you're so targeted on what you think you should be doing? Look for clues! If you keep getting pretty good offers or seeing opportunities pop up for other jobs you're qualified to work, then try taking that opportunity!

    Also, unfortunately ageism is a thing. Are you very young or over 50? Honestly a person at 50 has 15 more good years in them at least and is highly skilled but often passed over for someone a bit younger. If you think it is ageism, you might try road opening with your crown of success work.

    If none of that seems to apply, by all means, feel free to contact me (link in this article in another question,) and I am glad to try to figure out what the heck is going on. Maybe you're using money spell work and not job spellwork, which they are different things. 

    Alright kids, keep the questions coming. I might even do a part 2 for this month if you bring me something new and interesting!

    Thanks for reading!

    ~Cat

  • Hey everyone,

    A little over three years ago, my then fiance and I had an argument while drinking. He got heated enough that he left rather than let it escalate, and went over to a woman he had described to me as “incredibly ugly with skin like a burn victim,” but that she “clearly liked him” a few days previous to this argument, and they ended up sleeping together. He was not dishonest about what happened and I forgave him. She was incredibly unattractive (I social-media checked and had to see) and I figured if I was as unfortunate as she in the looks department, I might consider sleeping with someone else’s incredibly attractive man…I wouldn’t go through with it like she did, but I got how she was tempted, just not why she carried through.

    The next thing I know, he’s accusing me of crazy stuff like hacking his accounts and phone (I wasnt), and I keep noticing this guy I found out later was named Keith lurking around my house and staring at me (Amy’s “best friend” and reputed lover,) and things got very weird from there because she started texting me one morning me offered to steal all his money and bring it to my house….we had never spoken before and she wanted to rob my spouse for no reason. I still have the unedited text transcripts! I cant make this up…its just so stupid and insensible. Why? I can only imagine she was in her dope crazies, idk. Then told him she was with child around this time. At this point my husband (well fiance, – we got married 2ish months after this,) was being shown edited convos by her between her and I (he said they made little sense, and when he saw my side which was unedited, he was like “Holy fuck is she insane,”) where she tried to make me look bad. 

    But it gets weirder

    He and I broke up for 2.5 weeks or maybe up to 3. This is still the record so she has that feather for her cap. During this time, I would receive bizarre communications from her. Sometimes they accused me of things I never did, other times they called me fat (it should be noted, she was heavier than I was at this time, and now definitely is since I lost a nice piece of weight since ’22,) and often it was gloating on her fertility and my perceived lack thereof. I would have been 44 and she was 30. Like bragging your 14 year younger uterus works better than mine isn’t really an insult but a fact, and I guess I was supposed to be sad.  When Mr NinjaCat found out it really was her who was crazy in those few weeks, who was hacking his accounts, who was making things up, he understandably came back home eager to reconcile and after a week or two, I gave in. We reconciled. Of course he was concerned her child who wasn’t actually his was his, so we kind of had to pretend to be nice. She told him if he went back to me, he could never see the child. Hilariously we were married around this time, haha, but she didn’t know. She would call and accuse me to my husband of doing things like stalking and messaging her online when my husband was with me and I wasn’t on or near my phone (which he saw), saying it was going on at that moment. She replied to texts I sent him because she’d hacked his phone. She tried to come to my third job to harass me and got banned from the whole chain of stores for it. She was crazy. I also got pregnant around this time, and I even have transcripts of a bizarre conversation I still have where she offered to sell my pregnant ass meth (I don’t do meth,) so I finally ended her ability to talk and all our convos by saying that while she failed as a homewrecker, at least she succeeded as a gigantic fucking scumbag and blocked her. This is the last thing I ever directly said to this person.

    I suffered a miscarriage early on, and she made fun of me for it to my spouse when talking to him. So much compassion. He threw up in his mouth a lot not just a little…but we still thought that might be his kid, so we kept pretending she was a human to her (well, he did, – I didn’t speak to her anymore.) 

    When her baby was born she told my husband that he could never see her or the baby, and because of me. Mind you, I’d never wronged her and she’d tried to destroy my life for 9 months at this time. 

    She slept with my husband, and stalked us, and harassed us, probably was the cause of my miscarriage, but it’s my fault. 

    Now for all three years (it’s ongoing), she’s stalked me, but this is more than 2 years ago still. When we got the reports from DHHS (which explained a lot,) it ends up she was on cocaine, molly, methamphetamine and fentanyl throughout the pregnancy with the child we did not yet know was not my husband’s. We found out later that that baby has the wrong daddy on the birth certificate. No real surprise. He does look a bit like her “best friend,” who used to lurk around my old house and watch me (that was creepy AF.) Before this, she said anything and everything to defame my husband just in case the child she didn’t know the daddy to yet was his, and now you will notice she weirdly still brings him up a lot…even though he is in no way involved in my business or her life. 

    We figured this was 9 (more like 10.5 at this point) months of hell we went through. We could move on. She even got a protection from abuse from him when neither of us wanted anything to do with her. No one was contacting her. On it she claimed I’d moved closer to her – it was twice the distance away from her from my previous residence. I’m talked about relentlessly on the order and yet it isn’t about me, nor is it on me. I could technically contact her right now. I NEVER EVER WOULD. I am not fluent in skanky wannabe homewrecking psychopath…a problem I’ve had since before I met her, – and that much has been bad for my job as I had to turn down a few gigs for it.

    I mean, he paid dearly for that little affair. I can’t say I was still mad at him by then, – I definitely would not have been by this point. But I was the victim here (he, at the least, did do something wrong that started this campaign of crazy against mostly me and a bit him), and she just keeps victimizing me. 

    So after about a year of this crazy bitch, we figured we were good. Like, okay, we don’t want to contact this dumpster fire, and it is not his kid, and she clearly wanted to pretend she was a victim after being chased out of Portland (most of a small city hated her, ffs) for all she did, but this must be the end, right? HA! She had been harassing me through my forms for some time. She also harasses me by posting slander and libel and falsehoods on Reddit (and I suspect other sites.) For awhile last year (maybe again) the first result on Google about my business was her slander on Reddit which the mod is also legally responsible for allowing. You mouth breathers on Reddit (not all redditors but a few were true idiot mouthbreathers and believed it,) actually have seen her distinctly personal weird posts about me that tell blatant lies and call me a fat meth head pedophile. If you believed this person or engaged with them, you are as bad and a piece of shit – there’s no nice way to say it because only an imbecile or someone else with an untreated personality disorder really could believe that shit.The Reddit stuff I can trace back to maybe 3 months after she had her kid? It’s ongoing though. It may have started before, though, but initially it was only EMMY LIM, who blackmailed me for free work, and followed through with smearing my name when I fired her for trying to blackmail me. You know EMMY LIM as pomegranate. But she – AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS, ORIGINALLY OF GLOUCESTER (IF I AM REMEMBERING RIGHT) WHICH IS IN MASSACHUSETTS always harassed me and called me fat and infertile. She wrongly thinks my family is rich like Kardashians, she is very obvious and I even had a lawyer subpoena reddit IP address records which they did for the case, but ultimately, I couldn’t afford their retainer, so we only got so far…but I bet I can have that sent to the sheriff because…

    Guess what I got a few days ago through my forms – MORE THAN THREE YEARS AFTER THIS SHIT STARTED. This! Fat is a playground insult. Infertile? No client or person brings up my uterus. Ever. Never in 21 years of business has anyone contacting me for business ever discussed my fertility or used it as an insult. So easily-identifiable AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS sent me this:

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    And this is one of many she’s sent. Generally calling me things she is…fat, washed up…and again, no one has ever discussed my fertility in a business setting but that’s always been her thing. I can’t recall a single client ever calling me fat in 21 years of business and she was never a client. She’s 14 years younger so her uterus works better. Oh wow, not biology? My almost spotless level of contraception and entirely spotless record in having never slept with or romantically pursued someone else’s man really isn’t anything I’m ashamed of…but I mean, she is a known drug user, and scumbag so I guess my uterus and a playground insult of I’m “fat” is the best she’s got. Haha. My spouse and I are ready to sue her and since some of the harassment is over state lines from her, we hope we may have a federal case. What she’s doing is criminal in my mind, but it may end up being a civil case. 

    Since she has a fake account on my facebook to stalk me, and posts pics of me from my FB on Reddit, I used my real account to get these from her FB and here you go…

    This woman is about 14 years my junior and 2 years ago looked like this (there is a filter, and she does have skin like a burn victim, especially on her face, unfortunately for her. This is a flattering photo.) She’s 31-32 here and even with filters looks older than I do without one. 

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    This is her in her late 20’s or maybe mid 20’s?. Still filters. She has skin like burn victim. 

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    Both of these images were sourced from her public facebook images.

    This is me around 19 (so about 28/29 years ago – filters didn’t exist). It’s even a bad pic. Drunker than your uncle Randy, soon after I’d gotten into my sorority. 

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    This is me around 21/22 and I’m drunker than your uncle Randy there, haha. Filters didn’t exist.

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    This is me around age 30 – yet again with my sorority at our 20  year (for the whole sorority) anniversary and…drunker than you guessed who for it (love you ladies lol) and filters still did not exist around 2007

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    This is me about 3 years ago. 

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    I’m clearly not fat and I obviously didn’t peak at 17 (30 years ago, I was 17). I think I looked best at around 36…but I still get plenty of compliments. 

    So I had enough. Honestly, 3 years of waiting for this woman who IS THE POSTERCHILD OF A SEVERE UNTREATED PERSONALITY DISORDER, who KNOWINGLY SLEPT WITH AN ENGAGED MAN and then FALSIFIED THAT HE WAS HER CHILD’S FATHER IN ORDER TO KEEP HIM (and failed so hilariously it’s painful), who then spent the last THREE YEARS defaming me, stalking me, sending me hate mail, and literally saying horrifying and untrue things about me and my family on Reddit and God knows where else in what public arena while I stayed silent AND for years now and decides to make YET ANOTHER easily identifiable stalking email. This relentless stalking, and libel and harassment and abuse from her when I did not wrong her, but she has wronged me over and over…. ONLY this woman has ever used infertile as an insult to me. Ever. Even my hubs saw the most recent one and was like “Only Amy ever tried to insult you with calling you infertile, so I don’t doubt it’s her, Cat.”

    I had been patient for years, so the day I received this I (finally) CALLED THE SHERIFF! 😀 Now, if she wants to keep this up, I have copies of those DHHS reports I can post, I have chat transcripts, and I’m ready for court. I’ve saved all her abuse since it started in 2022! She’s lost me a lot of money because all the online harassment and libel she posted because of her glaring mental illness and horrifying drug dependence that has also almost lost her the child has, an innocent who she abusively used every drug she could get her hands on during her pregnancy with said child, and I’m reasonably sure libel and harassment for years on top of that might just get that kid a new healthy parent via the foster system since I HAVE NOT SPOKEN TO HER DIRECTLY WHATSOEVER SINCE WELL BEFORE THE KID WAS BORN. Destroying my life because she failed at stealing a man that was engaged then married to me is her sole goal. I don’t want any contact with her. She’s ugly, uneducated, a drug addict, clearly insane, has no job, and last I heard lived in a half way house or with mommy. We’ve heard both, though the source was her “friend’ who even called DHHS on her (Amy) before (hint for AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS – her nickname is the same letter as my first name that I don’t go by,), who had a falling out w my husband later and egged Ms Reynold’s on to start up again about 18 months ago. I pay my own bills, but she does not, so I guess trying to ruin my job when she doesn’t have one so far as I know, and therefore is only risking custody of her kid is the best she’s got. The sheriff said he’d have a nice chat with her, and since I have her mommy’s number, I made sure to give her mommy’s number to the sheriff too. 

    I mean, a child under 3 is very at risk, because her horribly untreated mental illness and drug addiction is really bad for parenting and she has both. She is clearly insane, and if this behavior is happening again, I presume she is also on drugs again.

    So, this is who you guys follow on reddit who says I’m a criminal (I’ve absolutely no criminal record,) I’m fat (not at all anymore, but I usta have a little bit o’ junk in the trunk, and honestly everyone loved my big butt…I only got rid of it because it was raising the blood pressure, lol, and yeah it was all in the butt really…) says I’m a drug user (I have no medical or criminal drug record, – absolutely zero, unlike her, and I definitely wouldnt fail a drug test right now – nothing illegal at all in my system) and that I’m a pedo (I don’t even like when people bring their children with them to my barbecue, and certainly have no attraction to any human under 35 anyhow…even 35 is a bit young.) If you believed any of it or any of the other horrifying awful libelous bullshit, rejoice because I actually think I’ll go after anyone agreeing with her on Reddit too. You are a party to criminal activity, after all. We were saving for a house, but my spouse and I have decided that house money should go to taking down a woman who I have lost any and all patience dealing with.

    To be fair, I wouldn’t want to talk to anyone who considers her human because I am skimming the surface of her many many many crimes against me – because I’m a woman who’s sole offense was my marrying my fiance she coveted – AND HE WAS MY FIANCE WHEN SHE FORCED HIS DRUNK ASS TO PUT A PAPER BAG OVER HER HEAD LONG ENOUGH TO HAVE RELATIONS WITH HER. She’s an ugly unstable garbage bag who actually allegedly overdosed her ex on purpose if what she said to others is right and couldn’t revive him so also a murderer. He was a dope fiend like her, so I’m sure it can’t be proven, and while he is definitely dead, I can’t substantiate that past what she confessed about (and she does have a loose grip on reality so it may not be true)…and she will continue to get away with that crime. I’m not perfect, but I’m not an adulterous alleged murderer on drugs like she is, to be sure. 

    Hope this was educational. Clownshoes always was a desperate, evil, conniving, revolting clown. I’m not sorry I’m better looking, better educated, less crazy, much more intelligent, have character and a personality that people like.

    And she was never a client, so she can’t review me. Why she’s allowed to or anyone is dumb enough to believe her is a mystery. Ask Reddit. She clearly was never my friend, and she clearly doesn’t know me because my parents aren’t rich like Kardashians, and frankly, calling me things like fat when I’m in better shape, ugly when I’m better looking, and accusing me of having a personality disorder or any criminal or medical record of drug use (when I am not the one stalking her for three years after failing at stealing her spouse, and she has a well known record of drug abuse, and probably a criminal record, too,) is pretty fucking creepy. 

    Hope you liked my tabloid esque true tale. Can’t make this shit up….and I’m tempted to post all the transcripts and abuse and DHHS reports but….this enough about my personal life. How did this blow up like this in the last three years? AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS who was joined by her friend, the blackmailer, EMMY LIM, who can’t tell even the same people the same false story about how I failed her, though….because she did carry through with the smearing my name when I wouldn’t give her free work. So, Emmy, you are at least a woman of your word. You’re a blackmailing lying cunt, but you are a woman of your word. 

    Normally sinking near to AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS’S level is so far beneath me that I wouldn’t do it, but the difference is nothing I’ve said here is a lie. And I don’t call her job (assuming she had one as the last one I knew she had was Longhorn Steakhouse 3 years ago who fired her for finding her shooting up dope on the job) or people she works for and tell them this…and I’d not be lying like she is if I did. 

    I built this business from the ground up and had an immaculate record for 18-19 years, and ever since my husband and I got in that fight three years ago, some nasty skank who sleeps with men who aren’t single has gone out of her way to destroy my life because she didn’t know who her baby daddy was….and she probably killed my miracle late life pregnancy off so making fun of my fertility not being anything anyone would ever say in any business setting tells me (and the sheriff) all anyone needs to know.

    Someone will always believe the wrong side, and I get that, but clearly, suffering in mostly silence was my mistake, and now I’m going to make public anything any time anyone pulls this crap again…I just didn’t think you wanted 85 or more pages of evidence on her. 

    Because we talk about the occult and spellcasting, and not about failed homewrecker and successful only at being a complete scumbag AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS. She’s a pisces, addict, degenerate, and doesn’t know who made her baby on her, so she clearly has enough problems of her own to work on that aren’t about me. Maybe she should. 

    It took a few days to post this. I promised AMY ELIZABETH REYNOLDS and EMMY LIM that if they wanted me to post the truth about them gladly would.

    ~Cat

    PS- I do mean it…if you believed anything she’s posted about me, because it doesn’t read like a client wrote it, you’re as bad as her. 18-19 years in business with hardly a single complaint, and if I’ve been in business 21 years, and she entered into my life 3 years ago, do the fucking math. Bullying me and doing this is sick

    PPS- For those saying this post will lose me business (because a few have emailed – people who have known me and seen what my being the victim of her slander, lies, and harassment has done to me, no less, and want me to be spared further damage), look, she’s lost me so much in the last 3 years that I frankly see no reason to hold back. Among my friends I’m known as an very honest person who would do anything for a friend, I’m an unfailingly loyal wife, and before all her libel and slander and harassment started over 3 years ago, I feel I had a pretty good life. For the last three years, her unprovoked relentless fictions and attacks on me have caused so much stress and damage to me, that you’re right….this is not how I normally act, – posting something of this nature, – but clearly, suffering more or less silently wasn’t working. So I thank you, and love you for your concern, but…I’m not being victimized further, and cursing an addict single mom with no job who’s life sucks anyway is only so effective – her life is already awful, so magically making things much worse for her entails things which cross moral lines I actually have as opposed to her. Time to confront the cause in the mundane, and bring her to court. 

  • Hey everyone,

    So, I wanted to try out something new. I've noticed a lot of people are paying up to $100 for a CHIME CANDLE service. A single CHIME CANDLE. Ahem. Since this seems to be the new equivalent for setting a light (it used to be a fancy glass encased candle,) and that also shouldn't be a $100 for a single one (unless for reasons I can't understand, inflation went super crazy while I slept last night,) I'll offer you something better. SEVEN chime candles (one a day for seven days,) and for $125. Any need. I will do a single candle spell once a day every day for seven days. 

    I anoint it in oils, cover in herbs, do the chant, and since it's so small (I literally burn these on my small plates,) I can also easily take a pic without fearing I'm going to burn my house down moving it away from everyone else's work, lol. 

    So contact me if you are interested!

    ~Cat

  • Hey Occulties,

    While I'm all for people making their own spells, keep in mind many people do not understand the herbs they put into a spell. 

    Creating a spell is a bit like creating a recipe. If you do not understand very distinctly the function of every ingredient and how it works with the other ingredients, you can't create a recipe. You might be able to cobble something to your liking out of other recipes (I use reese's temptations peanut butter cookie recipe with peanut butter M&Ms instead of a reese's cup, but I could not just off the cuff tell you the baking soda or egg or butter or sugar ratio if we just decided to make up an entirely new cookie, for example,) but even cobbling things together requires some understanding of what our ingredients are. 

    And when it comes down to it, many people really don't understand herbs, or they do something incredibly stupid like use Cunningham's herbal. Quick note on that – it was basically influenced by Herman Slater, who himself wrote an incredibly wrong book of hoodoo recipes wherein he said van-van oil (basically mostly lemongrass) was made with vanilla (not at all,) among other hilariously wrong recipes – both of them are dead now (they were lovers, and unfortunately both passed away from AIDS many many many years ago,) and Cunningham's heart was in the right place, but Herman Slater is so infamous as a fraud and a piece of shit that it's surprising anyone still uses or trusts Cunningham's Herbal, especially given the source of a lot of his info (the late Mr Slater.) 

    So if you have that piece of shit, throw it out. 

    Or when someone said quassia ashes could be used as a replacement for lover's hair, this is also exceedingly wrong and not a use for quassia wood. At least I can't even understand how that's possible or suggestible as I know what quassia is often used for and it is nothing to do with hair or love, really. 

    I mean, all of this is in books, and you're trying to learn, and now you're pissed because there's bullshit abounding everywhere, right? Well, I think I can help.

    See, every herb is best learned by getting to know it. I know, that sounds so terribly dull, doesn't it? But, honestly, it's not as dull or as hard to do as you might think…but you're right to think it isn't overnight. These lists that tell you x is a love herb, or y is for cursing are generally not telling you enough. Like…I only use patchouli for cursing (I dropped a whole bottle of patchouli oil in a drawer of clothes many years ago and can't bear the smell now,) but yet you see this in "love" and wealth spells too? Is this a miracle herb? Hardly. Patchouli excites lower urges and brings power to lust, wrath, and greed. So, technically, you might want someone to lust after you as part of a love spell, but if you only use patchouli and no other herb, it's not really going to be helpful. We might want to remember it used to be used to stop corpses from stinking before we improved on our embalming techniques, so it's probably not an herb we should associate with lasting romantic love, but many books describe it as a love herb, when the best it might produce is a roll in the hay. And it likes to feed off the other herbs you combine it with… Lemongrass is a bit like that at times, too. It's like it amplifies all the other herbs it's paired with but can be a bit…meh on it's own. Balm of Gilead pods are for healing, especially emotionally healing, so used for reconciliation, but, again, should be paired with a love herb. And yet, a well meaning person might see all 3 of these herbs listed as love herbs (Lemongrass and Patchouli are more lust herbs, but someone won't tell the reader that,) and combine all three in the hopes that their partner will make things official. I'm not really sure what that would do (the idea of mixing all three kind of gives me a headache,) but I assume it would actually create something like a weird argument about something your partner has been holding in followed by some make up sex. It would not manifest your partner making things official.

    How do you learn that stuff? Years of experience helps (ha!) but what also helps is starting small, and using what you have on hand. I don't know how many beginners go out and buy herbs that they don't need (I certainly did as a beginner,) and then wonder what they are going to do with four ounces of this or that. I ended up using all that stuff (because look at my job) eventually, but I know many people are not going to go as far down the path of spells as to become an expert, author, and practitioner for hire. I get there are a lot of folks who like to pretend they are a witch on TikTok (I recently received a fucking hilarious screen shot where an adolescent female pretended she was a high degree Mason, which would have fuckall to do with magic, and also be impossible given her age, and the fact that most masons are male, very hard for her to find a lodge,) but the thing about that is….

    Being an expert spellcaster requires a lot of time, practice, study, more practice, more study, even more study, practice, and study some more before you can actually be expert enough to be teaching others. I had 15 years of experience before I was writing this blog. I didn't just get a septum piercing, and go to Hot Topic, and figure I looked freaky enough to pretend to be a witch.

    And, I hate to break it to you, but the likelihood of you being any sort of magic expert when you're under 25, is very low. I say that as the "expert" among my adolescent friends who as an adolescent myself legit was still a bit fucking clueless when I was 22 on more than a few things. And I've been studying this shit intensely since around puberty (most of your parents were probably going thru puberty when I was to give you some idea,) so I assure you, if you weren't learning magic at your momma's knee, and your parents were not mega witchy, there's absofuckinglutely no way you're an expert at 21. Nor is your expert an expert at that age if you are learning from someone who only has the wrinkles they were born with and can't legally rent a car. I was a wunderkind, so I know. I caught plenty of shit for being "too young" at 27 when I started writing this blog. 

    But let me get off of my tangent. So, here's what I recommend. If you want to create your own spells, you need to know exactly why all of those ingredients are in the spell. If you want to use a particular herb, and you selected it from a vague list, feel free to contact me and ask me what the herb does. I get a lot of these requests and as long as you don't give me a list of 20 ingredients, I'm happy to help free of charge. For example, if you ask me what poppyseed is for – it is to make someone more calm and suggestible. While it can be used for confusion workings (which is why we see it in some curses,) it also works quite well to calm a reluctant ex and make them more apt to accept reconciliation work. It is NOT a cursing herb, despite being in some curse spells. Licorice root (for controlling,) is also in some darker workings but is not a curse herb. 

    And while I'm totally down with helping you, I want you to do yourself a favor and try to keep only 10-20 herbs on hand (not everything you ever saw once in an occult store, and you were sooooo curious,) so that you can LEARN THROUGH PRACTICE how these work with each other (or don't.) All of these herbs have personalities. And like I said, its like cooking…you might discover garlic one day when you are cooking and add it to everything savory (it is good for that,) then take a risk and add it to something sweet (which often makes a dish wholly unpalatable,) and learn that wasn't your best choice. Well, working with an herb magically can bring the same results.

    I can't sit here and provide an exhaustive list of all herbs and objects you might use (and books exist that attempt to do just that, so I won't bother,) but I'm glad to help (within reason,) for free.

    ~Cat

    All text and some images in this blog are copyright 2025 OriginalNinjaCat.com, and may not be used, reposted, or publicly shared without my express permission. Plagiarists will be treated to exactly what they deserve, which isn't going to be anything they want. If you see a plagiarist, contact me so I can deal with them harshly and accordingly. (21 years of handing plagiarists their own ass has been a joy and a pleasure.)

  • Hey Occulties,

    I originally wrote this for a client a few weeks ago, but it was pretty well written, so I edited it a bit to make it for everyone.

    I think the problem with "manifestation techniques," is that they are often so very wrong if one understand's the law of attraction well, and some of this can be that manifestation techniques often are paired with positive-thinking/affirmations type psychology made popular in the 1970's and even 1980's, which, while I'm certain it is helpful to some people's mental health, is not at all helpful when it comes to the law of attraction, which is basically like physics for magic and manifesting (I'd argue it is more complex than a single law but it all falls under the banner of law of attraction as a general term, so let's stick with it). So, sometimes people say something that being as I understand the law of attraction quite well would sound a bit like this "If I shove your house really hard, it will shove me back really hard, and I'll fall down, and charge your house with assault! It's physics!"

    Sigh. 

    Of course we know there is an equal and opposite reaction to our actions, so now I suppose that person really misunderstood physics, because the equal and opposite reaction does not mean the wall shoves you back. If you don't believe me, go punch a brick wall and tell me if it punched you back. Drop a pebble into a bucket of water and let me know if it bounces out and hits you in the hand you dropped it from.

    So, many manifesting books are really bad because they don't really understand the law of attraction, and they also seem to really try to mutate it to something that might half work at times too…but shows the person doesn't understand the law of attraction (or just think it answers to them…which no, even the best of us must work with the law of attraction to have it benefit us.) But they contain some psychology, and this can be very helpful for some people who really might improve their state of mind if they just had some optimism and hope injected into their lives (the mildly depressed? idk, I'm sure some group was helped.)

    And look, I know people who swear by manifestation techniques, and that's fine. I respect you feel that way, but I do not share in that with you and not least of all because I haven't seen any good examples of it having worked, and I can see many reasons it would not work. Maybe you're some grand-master manifester, and I'm just that weird hoodoo lady who sees it another way…but I did not come to my opinion without a lot of magic experience and reading, and study, and practice, so…

    Without my forcing anyone to have to take a bong rip to understand what I am about to say, I'll try to make this as simple as I can….but it may be a little bit weird, so please bear with me. First, you need to realize that POSITIVE is the wrong word when we talk about attracting a thing. When we think of things which are positive, we think of things which are generally pleasant, good, or enjoyable. NEGATIVE is equally wrong, as we tend to think of negative as being scary, unpleasant, evil, that makes us angry, or sick. In magic, and by extension manifesting, that a thing is pleasant or unpleasant may really have fuckall to do with bringing it to you, or into being, OR removing it from your life etc. So instead you must concern yourself with "attracting" and "repulsing" and "stagnating" and "keeping stable." 

    This is why some people have a hard time cursing for example. They try to bring a curse into being when the moon is waning because they think they want NEGATIVE ENERGY. While it can work that it can take from the target, (it really depends on the structure of the spell,) if you're using lunar correspondences, you may actually want to use the first quarter (which is waxing,) to GROW that curse. Just because it's for something dark, that doesn't mean you want NEGATIVE energy. 

    Again – remove the words negative and positive, as you will conflate them with "bad" and "good," when what you need to keep in mind is replacing "positive" with attracting/growing or "negative" with repulsing/removing

    And here is where it gets very weird:

    When you think of your journey through life, it's almost as if you should see this as a giant river. I'm not even sure we can see across it, because it's quite large. As three dimensional creatures, we can perceive time, but only in a straight line, so the river's motion forwards is our motion forward through time. On this river you can see things you want and people you wish to stay with who want your company too, and all things are flowing down this river. Sometimes we see something ahead of us and we seek to bring this to us, so we use attracting energy. Other times we see something we do not want, and we must push this away with repulsing energy. 

    You know, it's a bit like the very old original Super Mario games where you must go forward and miss all the obstacles and get all the coins or lives or whatever. If you aren't as decrepit as me, you may not get that reference, haha.

    However what many people miss is that fear is actually a very potent attraction energy. No one wishes to be afraid. It is very unpleasant. And yet, fear attracts what we fear. As we float down our figurative river of life, we glimpse things we fear, and many of us get scared and drive those things right to us.

    What's more, and perhaps on a slightly different tangent, but that which we fear, we give power to, – so if we worry about a rival for someone's affections, our fear that the rival may win our intended's heart actually gives that rival more power to do so. 

    But I don't see any of those manifesting books saying that you should be terrified of things most of us want like a loving partner, and a secure income, and a safe home, and financial security. Well, that wouldn't get reader's and supporters if they did. No one would enjoy the very unpleasant outcome of drawing things into your life that you're legitimately terrified of, even if those things were in reality beneficial. Instead they suggest something so wrong…

    Planning the path for your desired manifestation.

    And don't ask me why, but we as humans believe we are smarter than anything, and we've enjoyed being pretty fucking smart (maybe too smart for many organism's liking,) for some time now, but we sure as hell are terrible at finding the path of least resistance for something to manifest by theorizing exactly how it will go. In fact, it's at least 9 times out of 10 that we don't even find the 10,000th easiest way for the thing we want to manifest to actually manifest. 

    In our minds, we think we are really just plotting out likely events. But on our river of energy, we are pushing away key events that could bring our desired outcome much faster by imagining events that won't happen exactly as we have them in our mind. Now, to make this even worse, we may be attracting the desired outcome, whilst also repelling it which can lessen the benefit it has. Think of these fantasy events as creating a sort of forcefield or buffer. If we'd properly done a spell and then released it and thought as little of the people involved or desired outcome as possible, while taking on the idea what was requested is already ours (think a bit like ordering off of Amazon – you paid for it, and it just needs to arrive, so once you did pay, you already thought of it as yours…very similar,) we would have what we wanted. The person who has to plot this course forgets that every event they plot now has to happen to make the spell work – at least that's actually what you're (unintentionally or intentionally) attempting to manifest. That means every imagined and likely unnecessary, and even possibly impossible step that they drew out in their minds. What ends up happening is energy keeps being drained out trying to create an unnecessary (or even unlikely or impossible,) event that isnt even relevant to desired end outcome happening and until those events happen as planned, you actually repel the ultimate outcome to some degree. 

    I talk a lot about "dream girl," the girl who I worked for when I first started out who came to me asking to return an ex. I did my thing, but at least 2-3 times a week she'd go on about was he dreaming about her. I said that I didn't know. Anyhow, he returned to her, and a day or two after he was reported as back to being her boyfriend, I get an angry nonsensical email about how I failed and my spell was crap because even though he got back together with her (him getting back together with her romantically being what she'd requested,) he had not dreamed about her and she knew because she asked. He'd said he didn't really remember his dreams, but he didn't think so, no. Well, I told her she paid me to bring him back, and if he didn't remember his dreams, he'd never go back to her based on dreams….but she stubbornly swore that because he'd not dreamed about her, I'd failed. 

    It was actually that she had a very failing theory about why he would come back to her. 

    Now imagine you are in her shoes and want your ex back. I'm sure you think you know why they aren't coming around, and most of the time you only have a little bit right about what you suspect. It doesn't help that you, quite necessarily for your own survival, think like YOU think, which doesn't mean you think like your ex. The person who reasons how you reason is you…many of us will have dissimilar patterns of reasoning to yours. It is why we are all our own different people. And to add insult to injury, if you're calculating everything (very common in a love-magic situation,) and trying to glean little clues if it's going your way or not (common and very bad for manifestation), your little busy thoughts all over that active spell are scattering it's energy…. A-type personalities often don't do well in magic as they want to know if every trivial thing "is something" so they can plot ahead just a bit to what they should expect next. 

    Look, I'm not telling you everything is a blind leap of faith…it's more like relax and learn to cross a proverbial bridge when you come to it, and roll with the punches. If something seems bad (and sometimes it will,) learn to let it go. I'll have people give themselves full scale meltdowns about a "distant partner" who "must be with someone else" or "losing interest," only for the client to find out the person's schedule at their job suddenly went haywire when 2 people quit (for example,) and so they were overtired and overtaxed for a few weeks for it (and didn't want to burden my client with their complaints.) What's truly scary there is trying to prevent this person from upending their own work because they are so sure this behavior is entirely about them or about something disastrous for them before the partner tells them what's happening themselves. If you've ever tried to talk someone off a ledge because someone didn't answer their text fast enough or because someone wasn't flirty immediately (for reasons having fuck and all to do with the person complaining on it,) I don't recommend experiencing it. I can only liken it to a more coherent toddler who's angry and having a full scale meltdown over that they can't go out in the snow because it's summer.

    But you see, when we need to plot and plan, we get very angry when things do not exactly follow our plan. And life doesn't fucking care about your plan. Magic only does insofar as you want to run out the energy you put in by seeing if it can manifest your way (and it generally won't,) then trying to go back to the path of least resistance. AND YOU by making this treasure map have lessened it's energy by sending it down multiple wrong pathways with your plotting and theorizing. 

    And it comes back to the Turkey Sandwich Theory I have explained before. Let's say we both want a turkey sandwich with cheese, mayo, lettuce, tomato, and onion. We stop at a restaurant that looks to sell sandwiches and I order just that "Turkey sandwich with cheese, mayo, lettuce, tomato, and onion," and you order at another table or with another server something like this "I would freshly sliced turkey, but it must come from a male turkey who was locally raised and processed and allowed to free range, and sliced today, and you have to have cooked the turkey yourself. Also I only want romaine lettuce, and tomatoes which were grown within a mile of the restaurant. You must make your own mayo every morning before the sun rises, – and I will not ingest it if it is a day old – and the onion cannot be presliced. You must slice it yourself right before placing it on the sandwich. Also I need rye bread which is baked today, and the cheese must be lorraine swiss which has been imported from the Lorraine region. I will not take regular swiss." So, I get my sandwich very quickly. You may not get one at all. You had too many instructions and too many obstacles, when really, if you'd ordered the same thing as me, you'd be eating pretty happily. 

    People who have to know the exact route of manifestation and dictate it, – that's what they get…a lot longer of a manifestation phase, and maybe nothing at all. And for the same reason above – you wanted a turkey sandwich (whatever you spellcast for) but instead you had to get in the way and make some pretty exhaustive and exacting requests and now no restaurant will fill your order as it stands because it's too complicated (you had to dictate the how and why a thing would manifest so now it won't manifest.) 

    So, that begs the question as to why manifesting books often contain instructions like a treasure map to what you want if they are really about getting that through manifestation. That some people do OK if they can make little goals for themselves to reach a larger goal is very much true, – focusing on steps makes a formidable task become doable… problem being, you need to focus on each step and if your spellwork is focused on a bigger goal, you now need to make the end goal of that spell the only step. It's like some of you are trying to walk up a set of steps you removed since your end goal when you cast the spell or had it cast was a goal much farther than your planned steps to get there. 

    That's unintentionally confusing but think of it like "dream girl" wanted her ex back. This is the only step I made. Bring ex back to this person. He returned. She would have had me make him dream of her (he didn't remember his dreams,) which I may have succeeded at but it still would never have been the catalyst for them getting together. However if she NEEDED that step (clearly she felt she did,) she should have had me cast a spell to make him dream of her, plus also the spell where I successfully brought him back. That's 2 spells though. So, most of us would just remove the unnecessary step (dreams) and be happy with having the partner back. 

    This is sometimes easier explained by something that REQUIRES OBVIOUS STEPS BE TAKEN. If you don't have a high school degree, doing a spell to become a surgeon will be pointless. You will need to do work to obtain the necessary degrees (and attend all the classes, and graduate,) because magic can't create a degree you never earn. In fact, if you don't have a medical degree (or a high school degree,) the only way i know for you to get a medical degree overnight is to have a forger create a fake one for you. 

    But when it comes to romance, if you're trying to get your ex back, him or her making contact for the first time isn't the end goal, – it may be positive progress if it happens, but they may never break the ice that way. You might run into them somewhere instead of getting a text. You might never talk out your deep feelings…maybe you left them as your emergency contact and went to the ER unconscious and they realized you mean the world to them…or maybe they do text to ask you if you can tell them the name of the Chinese food place you always order from and end up talking things out. Either way…you didn't put in an order for that part. You put an order into the universe for your ex to get back. So the contact part? I don't know, and I don't recommend trying to figure it out. I just trust they will make contact and things generally will move forwards from there. But that contact? That's not really a step because we often don't order that step. 

    And the more we fuss and fume and social media stalk and worry and fantasize…well, the more we jam our progress on getting what we want. Focusing bitter feelings because you think so and so moved on pushes off the outcome. Fixating on that someone followed or liked or heart reacted on someone else's social media? Not only are you literally the picture of an obsessed stalker (so not sexy,) you are the poster child for lust for results. 

    I go over fail dates (if I don't get x by y date, the spell failed merely manifests failure on that day,) enough that I won't go into it right now… Because if I could just get people to cast a spell and clear their mind of it, I wouldn't keep having this conversation. Manifesting techniques don't work. They don't apply the right type of energy or emotion to drawing things to you. The best I can describe it is you need to accept that you already have what you requested, it just isn't here yet, and then let that "not here yet" part go. It's like ordering something through the mail. If you have to anxiously check it's progress the whole way, though, unlike the mail, you're going to delay it. AND that's assuming you take the mindset what you want is yours. That's easier said than done. It isn't how you'll feel when you first have it. That's manifesting something more transitive. It's more like…well, how do you feel when you've calmed down and accepted you're with the person you want. 

    Let's say I give you a brand new car in some model you've always wanted all for free. The day I give it to you, you're going to be beyond stoked. Even a week or so later, you're probably going to be like "FUCK YA MOTHAFUCKAZZZ!" What about six months later? At this point, you no doubt are happy with your car, but you aren't ecstatic like you were, right? That's where you want to put your mindset at when spellcasting. The part where you've gotten past the excitement. 

    And manifesting techniques and magic books often don't explain that.

    So…to sum it up, because it's me running on tangents all over, what have we learned?

    That we are bad with knowing how or why a thing will manifest, and that trying to sleuth and theorize how it will actually harms our spell's energy and impedes manifestation (even if just using manifestation techniques,) 

    That we tend to repulse and push things off by engaging in fantasizing and theorizing

    That spying on our targets and frequently ruminating on the situation and people involved actually delays manifestation or kills our spells altogether in some situations

    That we need to send out what we want and not dictate how we get it

    That the universe gives no fucks about our plans and that our plans and preconceived ideas on how something will happen are often wrong

    And that we need to take the mindset what we have asked for is already ours, it just has not arrived yet. 

    Hopefully this was sensible enough for everyone to understand. 🙂

    ~Cat

  • Hey kids,

    So, about three times a week – sometimes more, sometimes less, – I'm required to piss someone off or give them a slight. It's not that I want to make them feel bad, it's that they completely ignored the terms of service and other pages they agreed to which state not to text me, use chat, or use social media to contact me through, excluding emergencies, and to use email only to prevent me losing threads or following up, and allow me to keep business in one place, while also limiting contact which may reach an abusive level. I have to say this because having gotten access to some chat service, they ignore the rules, and try to enjoy easy access to me via these services, which if I leave this breach of the rules unchecked turns into something pretty shitty for me…25 or more unpaid hours chatting. So, to put this in perspective, I already work an average of 60 hours a week. I am expected – with no increase in pay – to add 25 hours to this. And no, the single client may not be the cause of 25 hours, but in some cases, yeah I'll even get a single client who, feeling they have unfettered access and I have no clients or life outside of them, will just go ham. 

    But it's actually even worse than just working way more for the same amount. It also means that I have to check chats on several platforms (many of which I don't look at even weekly, like Whatsapp,) or that people think they have unfettered access because they can text me, when in reality, I'm a terrible texter and take hours and days to respond to people I personally know and love (so for business, it's even riskier.)

    Obviously no one likes to be told that their chatting with me is work to me, and I personally feel like a real jerk because as much as I may like the client, there's a million non-work things I want to do with whatever time i have outside of work, and talking about someone's emotional issues and relationship issues isn't really fun for me, especially after doing just that for pay for all the hours I worked. Plus, it's my paying job, so much like I'm sure you don't want to work 25 hours more at your job for no increase in pay (or even 3 hours more for no increase in pay,) I do not want this either. 

    And my friends who work in my industry make similar complaints. This is our job. It isn't volunteer work. I have posted days off, for example, and I get non stop texts and inquiries and have even had people pissed off when I didn't do a scheduling request on my day off (Sunday,) because I figured it wasn't an emergency and could wait til Monday. This literally led to an epic battle and chargeback, and it was my sole "error" and not even an error. She lost the chargeback dispute lol. 

    What makes this all the more irritating is some people think I'm a free research tool. Well, this is also my job. I'm pretty dang thorough in explaining things in my writing. But if you want to know what plants correspond to Jupiter, tor what offerings this spirit likes, or why this event may have happened after you cast x or y spell….here's these neat things called books, and this other great thing called google, and you might actually use those instead of expecting a live person to tell you…since basically you are asking that live person to work by doing so (I don't enjoy spending my free time working for no pay any more than anyone else,) and getting frustrated in many cases when they don't want to spend their free time helping you for hours for no compensation. While I'm willing to explain my own written work to clarify for free (which is it's own tedium but helps me be more concise in the future,) and even answer a few questions here and there, if I'm asked general questions that require long answers, I may point you to the QYAM archive or you may wait. 

    Answering questions directly regarding paid spellwork is something I do, but even then if the support becomes egregious and takes up more than a specific amount of hours in my week, that is considered abuse. 

    Why? It's my paying job, and if I'm working for below the federal minimum wage (making $2/hr or something,) that's abusive on the part of the client, and not a situation where I can sustain paying my bills on that wage. 

    But here's the thing – THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE WHO ENGAGE IN THESE PRACTICES IN NO WAY WISH TO BE ABUSIVE OR ILL-MANNERED! Instead, they don't really realize what they are doing. 

    So, let's compare this to something. Let's say a person who works above you in your company realizes you like the same hobby they are just beginning to take an interest in. They have very little knowledge and ask if they can ask your advice from time to time. As they pay your check, and because you have no idea that they mean "be my free on demand tutor", you agree and give this person your cell number. Almost immediately you are asked questions like why people do this thing like this, and the history of that, and did you ever make this, and what does this mean….the moment you leave work til 1am, and then when you wake before work, you are being asked about this hobby. Of course, you don't want to be rude, as this person pays your check, but this is a lot of extra work and you'd much rather be spending time with your romantic partner or doing things you like doing rather than say, explaining the history of crochet to Bill from accounting for 4 hours one night. And then of course, it worsens because they start to just casually hit you up and ask your opinion on things which are perhaps related but not the hobby itself. Of course, when you finally say you are really busy, and try to explain the situation, this person becomes incredibly defensive, and now you get demoted, or get a really bad quarterly review. 

    That's hugely abusive. Anyone would agree. 

    But when it comes to people in my job, it's considered okay to hit us up on chat or text and ask why this clearly fraudulent and awful spell from tiktok says it will do x thing, and didn't do anything, and to make me describe how none of the elements of the spell line up with any established magical practice historically, how no practitioner would say it was a real spell, that some pretty adolescent girl clearly made it up so she could pretend to be a witch, and that really even a novice could tell it's not real…which of course takes a huge discourse and discussion to explain this without hurting feelings, plus you also need to discuss their feelings about the spell etc. This isn't rare, and you bet that 90 minutes later, when I've lost all that time discussing something that has very little to do with anything I want to do with my free time, the person asking may be satisfied, but I'm screwed out of 90 minutes of free time which may have been the only 90 minutes I had to do the things I like doing…so I can work, do housework and sleep today? Ah shit, I actually needed 30 of those minutes to clean so now I even have to take away 30 minutes of sleep because you liked a clearly fake garbage spell and insisted I spend 90 minutes I kind of didn't have to explain it's fakeness and reassure you.

    BUT the client has this idea that this is normal and healthy because they have easy access to me via social media chat or text. This familiarity is like the business example above where, having agreed to help when the person needed a little help on a hobby turned into a full time job explaining everything and anything that crossed the mind of the other person…and when asked to halt this, hurt the feelings of the person being abusive as it FEELS LIKE YOU ARE CONTACTING A CLOSE FRIEND. It loses it's professionalism here. 

    People really like feeling like we are more like friends rather than client and worker. And I adore many of my clients and can even have fun chatting sometimes…but at the end of the day, we need to make it so neither of us is absorbing the other's day on any frequent level. 

    So, ask yourself this – are you asking for a lot of assistance on a paid service? If you are a paying client, of course I agree you should be able to have questions pertaining to the the service answered. If it's not an emergency, however, you should not expect an immediate answer. You have to keep in mind that the person performing this service has a lot of other clients and may need time to respond. If it IS an emergency, you should be capable of telling the person that it is INCREDIBLY TIME SENSITIVE, rather than you feel bad or scared or upset which makes it feel like an emergency, perhaps, but really often is just you being emotional and not one. "I had a scary dream last night," is not an emergency. I had one woman who literally disrupted an entire courtroom during a civil property case I was involved in because she was having a meltdown that a man she had broken up with a year ago was now dating new people (which actually made him realize how much he missed her, and he returned! It wasn't even a bad thing!) This was very abusive of her. She was blocked on my phone thereafter, and honestly, she's a lovely person, she was very embarrassed and I appreciate her allowing me to use it as an example, lol. ALSO KEEP IN MIND THE CONTENT OF YOUR REQUEST. No one should be expected to reassure you every moment, of course (and plenty of people ask me to help them when they have the most trivial of concerns, and can quickly become problematic,) but if you're repetitively asking HOW spells work or WHY something is happening, it's really a bit off when you have my huge corpus of work that explains all those things, but if you're like an abusive person I'd fired because she made me repeat over and over the same concepts, then looked up some of the worst advice on the internet and made me explain why it was wrong, – and basically, not only had I explained everything 20 times over (often on the same day, but every day she contacted me,) I was also constantly expected to act as free therapy. No where in my job description does "FREE THERAPIST" come up. In fact, it clearly states in my TOS that I am not your therapist. Further, while of course I want you to understand what's going on if you have questions, nowhere in my job description is the title FREE TUTOR. I've spent years of my life writing this blog. It is so full of info it is bursting. 

    BUT, tell someone to keep contact to email and on topic, and explain patiently that over familiarity can create a toxic situation where I am expected to work an extra amount of time one might work at a part time job TOTALLY UNPAID, and that I like to have some time to myself…and I'm the bad guy.

    TUTORING (spell coaching, one on one teaching,) is a job. 

    THERAPIST (reassuring, helping get through your emotional issues, cheering you on, explaining basic psych) is a job

    If you want to PAY ME to do either, then I will gladly help you. But neither is a free service, nor should anyone working as a practitioner for hire be expected to do either for free. 

    If you keep that in mind, and be respectful of my time or your worker's time, you won't ever need to worry that you're a burden or that you've become abusive. 

    Hopefully that explains things,

    ~Cat

  • Hey Occulties,

    As I'm about to put up a new spell for you all to use, I'd like to take a moment to discuss realistic expectations and the sphere of availability, because, while I've discussed this before, we all know a lot of people won't take the time to peek at those articles, and I want to be sure everyone has a fair grasp on what to expect. 

    Now, I want you to think of something you really want, and make it something that is pretty far out of your reach at this moment, but not so far that it's ridiculous. So, let's say right now you can't afford a car and don't have one, but you'd be willing to settle for a used one…and if you're being fair, you really like one that costs around $10k. Problem being, you don't make $10k per month right now, and even if you did, you have rent and utilities and bills to worry on so it's not like you even have the means to spend every penny you make on a car. By your estimation, what you CAN save per month, means that a used car will take you almost 18 months to get. To complicate this, you will need to buy insurance and pay for costs of registering the car, etc, and that means it could take an added 2 months on top of that. You really don't want to settle for anything lesser as it might just fall apart and then you need repair costs, so you feel kind of stuck. 

    In short, spending $10k on a vehicle is kind of out of your reach.

    You look into getting a loan but the loan is also going to cost you more per month than you can afford to spare. It might cut down the time you need to save if you get this loan, but now you're strangling your finances in 6-8 months if you get it then, and making it perilous for yourself because if you are going to have 0 left over after paying the car loan monthly…well, one little unforeseen emergency happening means that car could cost you your home if it was a big enough emergency (rentals aren't cheap and neither are mortgages, ugh.) 

    So, you turn to magic. You do a spell and now there's a pretty nice used car for cheaper. It's still out of your price range because it's $6k. You see a real junker and that might be something you can get in a month, but again, it will likely need repair even though it's pretty good for a $2k car, and it has about 43 million miles on it, so how much longer is it going to last? Your options improved a lot, but it's still out of your reach! What gives? 

    Well, look, I'll be honest and say I've seen some "get a vehicle" spells manifest very nicely with someone getting something in their price range and in good repair for quite a steal, so this isn't to discourage you from trying…but we sometimes need to be more mindful of our sphere of availability, and in this case, the person seeking a $10k car now when it's so far out of their budget, was not being mindful. The desired outcome lay too far beyond the borders of their sphere of availability. 

    Imagine now that my neighbor Bob has a gorgeous mature rosebush with two-toned red and gold roses. I look at his rosebush every day and want one like that for myself. So I go to the local hardware and garden store, and lo and behold there are some options for similar types of roses. One costs around $20 and is not even a shrub. It's baby tea roses in a pot – basically what rose seedlings are, and plus I want full sized roses like Bob, not little tea roses. The next is about $30 and is a dormant shrub. It looks like a twig with roots. Now the next option is a "bush" that looks like a wooden chicken foot and leg (not the meaty part, haha,) covered in wax coming out of dirt, and this is about $40. Then there is a smaller bush all bloomed up and full of foilage and this looks similar to Bob's mature bush, just much much much smaller, and this is $60. I look and look and finally in one store I find a bush much like Bob's rose bush (a bit smaller maybe but quite close to the same,) and this is $125.

    My maximum budget though, is $30.

    Now before I go on, the "maximum budget" is your maximum reach to bring to you that which you desire, with the rosebush being the desired end result. In spells I might want something grandiose, but I have to keep in mind how much power I have to draw to myself that which I want. So much like my "budget," my energy will only pull something in so far, okay?

    So, I go home with a dormant shrub which if you are a horticulturist at all, you will know….it looks like a tiny twig haha. But it's all I could get. Is this a loss? Not really, because if I care for the plant, if I nurture it, I will eventually have a bush rivaling my neighbor's mature rosebush. Of course…it might take a few years. However, whilst I was at the garden shop, I had noticed that bloomed shrubs went for $60. So, I go home and plant my little dormant rose shrub and it blooms within a month. I sell it back to the garden shop for a trade of two dormant shrubs, and in a month, I raise those up. 

    Now back to our magic. The shrub represents how far you can get with your spell. You got to one benchmark, then you went back and did another spell, and now you're much closer to your goal. Because you got your shrub, let's say you're about a quarter there, then when you trade for two, you're halfway there when you bloom those out, and now trading them for four, when these little dormant shrubs mature into foliage and flowers, now you can trade for that nice mature rose bush, just like your neighbors. 

    BUT, it took you 3-4 months to do this. You did not do it in one step. Still….you could have worked on that first dormant shrub you bought for a few years and had this as well…just you sped up the outcome by continually working towards your goal to bring the desired end more rapidly.

    Spells can work like this. I may want something well out of my reach. But if I work to get a few steps closer, and let the spell manifest, then use magic to go another step further and faster than I could get there without the spellwork, the thing I want can still be mine. I just can't accomplish it in one step. I have to work towards it like I did with the rose bush example. 

    People don't like this. We live in an instant gratification type of society. 

    And allow me to be very frank – I want what I want RIGHT NOW too, haha. 

    It's only natural we feel this way. We have been raised to see the goal and yet we don't emphasize to people that often to reach a big goal, there's plenty of steps involved. 

    Have you ever been to a friend's home (or maybe your own,) where the friend had gotten depressed and stopped cleaning for a month or two? It's not uncommon and many people I know have had this happen or have seen it happen. Now the house is a mess and they are overwhelmed. How do you solve this problem? It's a lot to clean, but you start by focusing on one chore. So you tell your friend, start gathering the dirty laundry and put it in the washer, and I will start washing the dishes and putting them away. You move through the house like this. You focus on one chore, and then the next and in a few hours that house will look so much cleaner than it did, and you won't feel like it's overwhelming to keep going. 

    Well, working towards a goal works like that, too. You focus on a step that is closer in reach. So if we go back to our car example, I might say…look, part of the problem is I don't make enough money to get the car I want or to keep it if I get it. So, what I could do, is I might do some work for a promotion at work to make more, or a new job. I will need to keep in mind it needs to be something I have the training and qualifications to do, and that the pay scale must be realistically what people can expect as pay for that job. No one is going to pay you $125/hr to flip burgers or sell shoes. HOWEVER, if you're making $16/hr at your current job, but there's another one you have all the qualifications for (just in a different industry,) for $40/hr (and maybe it's not something you would love doing – maybe it's cleaning houses, but you know how and it's not hard,) then you might do a spell to get the job if you want to ensure you get it. Now you're making a lot more per week, and this goes towards affording a car. 

    I'm purposely using numbers to help you understand. We tend to understand that if we want a thing that costs x, and we earn y, that we must save for a specific time or earn more to get an item that is currently out of our financial reach.

    And when you think about it, if you are now earning almost 3x what you once made, you might be able to budget and get the car that way…but it's still going to take longer than you'd like just budgeting. HOWEVER, since you make more, you might do a spell to get a car you want and be able to afford it, and now, suchas in our earlier example, you are getting options you can afford, whereas before you were not because you earned so little. 

    So with each step we take, we increase our sphere of availability. That means we increase the reach of our magic. If you think on the rosebush example, first I had one $30 bush, but when I got that, I quickly made it so my reach was now double what it was when I hit that goalpost. I then quadrupled my budget by working a bit again, thus quadrupling my sphere of availability. With the car example, I worked on the main issue keeping me from being able to afford a car – low income, – and by increasing my income, I increased my sphere of availability, thus making a car within my reach – even by using a spell to get a more affordable option than I'd have without a spell. 

    So, we focus on one problem that's keeping us from our desired goal, rather than the whole end goal. We do this and as we fix or repair the smaller issues, we grow our sphere of availability, which in turn brings us to our desired goal faster with each step. 

    WHAT THE HELL DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH GETTING MY EX BACK? some of you are saying. 

    Ah, well, I stuck to numbers because that's a bit more logical than love, but that's a fair question. Let's say your ex moved away, isn't talking to you, is still very angry with you, and you think one stinky reconciliation spell will fix that. Well, you try that and unbeknownst to you, your ex forgives you, but they still don't want to speak to you, still live far away, and just forgiving you didn't mean you were getting back together. In fact, from where you are, it looks like nothing happened at all. That's OK though. Maybe you should try a communication spell next, okay? And so you do, and now you're unblocked and your ex asks you something pretty unromantic and doesn't seem too interested in coming back…and still lives far away. Well, you might try a love-drawing spell next. Now your ex texts you and is flirty and seems kinda interested in you again! So other than this person living far away, you basically are so close to what you want! Well, now you'll have to tackle the distance issue, either through magical or not magical means, but you have your ex wrapped around your finger so I bet you're a lot happier. 

    But it took steps, didn't it? Just like all the above examples took steps. With each step, you grew your sphere of availability but you had to tackle a few issues to get to where you want. 

    Realize then that there are a lot of things we want right now that might be enough out of our reach that we will require steps to get there. This isn't a failure on the part of magic itself, but rather a failure of the petitioner or spellcaster (depending on if the petitioner is the spellcaster or is dishonest with their spellcaster,) to accurately assess the amount of work required to get to the goal. So when you do a working with the intention of say getting your ex to come back, if there's a lot of damage and issues, it can easily require a few workings to bring that goal into your life. It means that it won't take 5 days or something equally short to get what you want. 

    And unfortunately there are a lot of charlatans out there who feed on people who don't understand spells and magic who have this desire to have what they want RIGHT FUCKING NOW, and so they will tell you they can bring something to fruition without steps or even without requiring a few days. They are basically saying they are super-powerful. Yet if we look at magic like a muscle, the amount of muscles they would need to do what they say would basically mean they are Godzilla and not human. Realistically, an expert caster may need weeks or even a few months on really difficult problems that are well outside of the client's sphere of availability. 

    And, if you are the spellcaster, if you're an expert you may have more "muscles" in casting spells, but if you're a beginner…you may have less reach from not having built up this strength. It should never reach Godzilla-strength so be wary of those who claim to be able to tackle every issue with such speed and ability, but yes, and expert should be able to bring more and faster than someone unpracticed. YET ALL OF US NEED TO MIND THE SPHERE OF AVAILABILITY because by so doing, we not only keep our expectations in a realistic place, but we also spend less time reaching that goal by creating goalposts which help us get there. 

    Hopefully that made some sense.

    ~Cat

  • Hello Occulties,

    I'm sure my own derision of certain practices using newer forms of media to reach a new generation of occultists hasn't been missed, but when it comes down to it, that's less to do with the media being used and more to do with the vast majority of purveyors of "information" who use these forms as their major platform.

    Allow me to help you to understand this if you're learning.

    A bit over a hundred years ago in the United States, it was not at all odd to have a traveling "doctor" arrive in your town, hocking a miracle cure. We still refer to these folks as snakeoil salesmen and they were a very real thing. Dr Quackenstein's miracle cureall  (which might contain morphine or cocaine or both but was probably 90% grain alcohol at best,) would be sold to you via Dr Quackenstein who had, in advance, brought along a few folks who pretended to be suffering some greatly crippling ailment, be miraculously cured after sipping a bit of Dr Quackenstein's Miracle Cure-All. Dr Quackenstein would display clearly falsified credentials and after selling bottles of his fake medicine would travel quickly to the next town, always fooling more townspeople. The cure-all cured nothing, and people ended up losing hard earned money for something that did not cure anything (excepting maybe a little back pain for a day or so.) 

    This is because he put on a great spectacle, and since time immemorial, the weak minded and the ignorant have been greatly moved by a spectacle. This also was because like many people trying to learn spellcasting and/or find spellcasters, people were so ignorant on the topic of medicine, that you and I might laugh at their ignorance today, but even smart people back then really didn't know much about medicine. I am reasonably sure people still got bled by their doctors for certain conditions (but that might have fallen out of favor a few decades previous.) 

    Now back in Dr Quackenstein's heyday, it helped quite a bit that medicine was not what it is today, and that many were illiterate, and that many were never ever going to have any sort of medical knowledge taught to them. It helped that many still believed the miasma theory (bad smells were the carrier of disease,) and that our understanding of bacteria and viruses was still very poor. 

    Just as it helps people who put on a spectacle to attract customers now that many of you do not realize that the study of the occult has been a serious field of study (the best occultists I know are far more like college professors than they are like goth looking hippies or wizards painted on the side of a 1970's van,) and that being psychic is actually as rare as maybe being born with green eyes. In fact, serious scholars who were not out to wow you with their miraculous exciting stunts (so they were not entertainers,) and people who were a form of medicine man or woman who also took their craft as seriously as the midwife might, – these are our forebears. That some people with talent may have been showboats is very true, but a serious occultist has more in common with a real doctor or professor than he or she does with today's Dr Quackensteins. 

    BUT, because people are so ignorant about the study and practice of the occult, they are their forebear's equivalent of the townsperson running to purchase this cure-all, and eschewing the doctor that has a PhD in medicine and has been the town doctor for 20 years, since Dr. Realdoctor sure as hell never cured blindness (and Dr Quackenstein cured that stranger's blindness when he stopped through, right?) Dr. Quackenstein dressed like he had money, – all flashy and fine? Meanwhile the town doctor had a battered old medical bag and …I mean, he's not made much being the town doctor since he allowed you to pay him with chickens sometimes, so he must not be as good as Dr Quackenstein. 

    That's what you all are doing when you tell me this person PRETENDING TO BE A PRACTICING SPELLCASTER told you that say…cinnamon replaces brick dust when sprinkled around the home. No. BRICK DUST – as popularized in the horrid movie Skeleton Key, has some historical significance as a protective powder in hoodoo. If you replace it with cinnamon it is not at all going to help you except I guess your house will smell like cookies for the first gust of wind that passes through. You are disseminating Dr Quackenstein's theories as far as you can if you pass that rotten bit of advice along.\

    But Dr Quackenstein is fun, and convincing, and so in tune with modern times right? Yeah, kids, I get it. I've seen the young adults who are literate but can't read a book and sadly it's mostly their parents and teacher's fault for exposing them to tablets and forms of media we now realize are as addictive as drugs pretty much at birth. And the other reality is experts would be older and would not be like to come from that generation, and therefore would be all about the books (SO MUCH OF LEARNING SPELLCASTING IS READING! Oh so many hours of my life spent reading and studying! I could have 8 PhD's with all this damned reading!) 

    So, I want you to understand…. I want people to learn real stuff. I want them to know the history, and how this works and to be able to pass on the accumulated knowledge of all the real occultists who came before them and before me, and during my time, to other generations that come long after I am dead. But to do this we need to push against the Dr Quackensteins. We need to tell the people who thought it would be cool to pretend to be a witch on TikTok to fuck off. That's like thinking it's cool to pretend to be a doctor, give out medical advice, and kill people in so doing, because you know it's totally neat to pretend to be a surgeon to your followers. 

    It's not that I hate new forms of media. It's that the people who are more apt to use them are not apt to be experts, and many of them are Dr. Quackensteins. There's some great folks who are the real deal who are using those new forms of media, too. Just you need the real occultists who are on the platform start to increase in number (and they are daily), and realize that the Dr Quackenstein's of the world are PERFORMERS (most occultists are more like PROFESSORS,) and that if someone is putting on a real show…they probably are just an entertainer, not the real deal.

    I really hopes this helps many of you. 

    ~Cat

     

  • Greetings everyone,'

    I missed you so much. After Mr NinjaCat, and spellcasting, writing is my true love. Unfortunately doing it on an old iPhone is something I definitely do not love, haha, but I've solved that problem and can type on a traditional keyboard again. 

    So, as tired as it may be for some readers, I'll start with a Questions You've Asked Me and hopefully move on to a fresh spell article thereafter. Because I have some great questions saved up…I have to get to these first.

    Q: Why are so many spells for personal gain, rather than the good of the community or people?

    A: Well, let's start with the idea that you propose that most spells you or the reader knows are solely to profit the petitioner (personal who the spell is cast on behalf of,) or someone they care about (so to indirectly benefit them.) Now, I think many of my readers are familiar with love spells to get the love of a particular person. How hard is it to work on a person, – to change their mind? It can be very difficult, especially if the target is resistant. Now apply that to thousands or up to even millions or perhaps billions of people. So this kind of work is understandably hard to make effective on a large scale sometimes. And cursing someone can be hard for some people, but imagine you go after your perceived problem person in a political place – so you're trying to say, destroy a leader you believe to be a detriment to your city, state, region, country, etc. This person clearly has supporters, all of which add positive protective energies which can undermine your work, so you can face a pretty powerful opposing force. If 500 people are praying for this leader to remain in power or even expand his or her power, than 5 going against this person are facing a very large block. 

    So, it's not that we don't have historical examples of people using their spells for what they feel is the greater good, it's just that, generally speaking, when we see magic in today's society like that, we are seeing religious groups working together for a particular leader or cause, as this is more effective than the solitary practitioner working for or against such a large group.

    But realistically, humans are also very selfish creatures who often are more worried with the issues we are directly dealing with – our income, our romantic life, etc – than those we are enduring on a greater scale. Basically, you care more about if you can pay your light bill than you care if an unnamed person has food enough to feed their family. 

    Therefore, the reason is that people just are more concerned about themselves, and also likely will have little to no impact by themselves on a complex societal ill. 

    Q: My offerings to a spirit got MOLDY! Was it refused? (I know this is a repeat but it was asked a lot for a few weeks.)

    A: Ouch. Well, it can sometimes mean that it wasn't exactly what the spirit wanted, yes. I've had "food fails" happen, and interestingly only one object of many got the ick in a few of those cases. When this happens, I do try to avoid serving the same thing twice if it got mold. 

    BUT, look, you don't need to leave things out for forever. Food in certain homes and climates can attract pests. If you can't leave a half a sandwich somewhere for over x amount of hours without bugs or mice being a risk, then don't leave offerings out longer than that. I try to leave mine out for at least a day but in my climate this is entirely non-problematic. 

    Outside of that, don't get too freaked out. Try a different food item than what got moldy next time. Many spirits DO appreciate any gift, but just like humans, they don't like everything so sometimes you made a really nice gesture (appreciated,) but the gift itself just wasn't anything very liked. Think of it like coming to dinner and while you loved the entree, you weren't really into the vegetable, or maybe you didn't like the side. Were you mad at your host for making you a free dinner? I sure hope not! But you don't have to enjoy everything served to appreciate the gesture, and that's the same with spirits.

    Q: (also a repeat but I've gotten it several times recently) If I am positioning an altar or idol in a particular direction, what does that mean exactly. Which direction am I facing if I am working on that altar or placing that idol?

    A: Super easy. So if I place the altar to the east, that means when I stand at it, I face eastward. If I am placing statuary to the east, then the statue is going to have it's back to the east, and face me as I stand, directionally facing eastward. Remember, as the operator or supplicant, where you are facing – so where your eyes are directed towards, – if required to face a direction, – is what is meant when you are directed to place an altar to the east, west, south, north, or even northeast, northwest etc. For an idol or statuary, when we are working with this being we will face to the direction indicated, with the statue (if it is of a being,) facing us. So technically, the statue is facing in the opposite direction. Hopefully that was clear. 

    Q: My love target keeps returning, then leaving, and I have to do the work again, with each time needing more and more effort to get my target to return – what gives?

    A: Are you refusing to work on your own toxic behaviors? And before you tell me they are toxic (which is highly possible, as well,) I am not asking why you are reconciling a toxic person who you blame for breaking things off. I am asking you, are you working on yourself (non magically,) and not repeating your own toxic patterns and behaviors (or trying to eliminate them. Trust me, there are no innocent parties and you do have them, even if the other person is more severe. Until you are accountable and working on yourself, too, the situation will continue to deteriorate even if you use love work to bring this person back. 

    This is something I frequently repeat, and not because I like to, but because it bears repeating.

    Next, how compatible are you? I have seen couples who can't keep it together because they communicate badly. AND, if communication work is applied at a regular rate, this problem does improve the relationship, leading to less or no break ups. However, this won't overcome having different life goals (example, one wants children or marriage, the other wants neither,) or huge personality conflicts (sometimes we really like how  someone looks and makes love, but we don't really like them so much, or vice versa,) or just incompatible styles of contact – some people feel very trapped by cuddly and very affectionate folks, others require this. So, start understanding your goals, values, and love languages and see how compatible they are. Sometimes they are very poorly aligned. 

    If that doesn't provide the answer, ask yourself, is every time I bring this relationship back together like ressurrecting a corpse? haha, yes really. Do you feel like what once took a magical nudge, now feels like it's taking greater efforts? And for less time? One reason I am very secure in my relationship is that whenever we have a serious falling apart, when we come back together, it is 3 times stronger and better. We learn from our problems and grow back even better. But if that isn't the case for you – if it feels more tenuous and fragile each time, – then possibly you are doing what I term "holding the target hostage in a relationship." You don't want to give up so you keep roping them back in, and each time, they try harder and harder to escape. That's the opposite of what should be happening if we are healing or working on a healthy viable relationship.

    Again, I say this a lot and have said it many times here and privately to clients over the years, but love spells do not create compatibility. If a relationship has elements which cause it to disintegrate without love spells, we need to examine this and see if it is something we can change and improve independently, or if it's a problem where it's so deeply a part of one or both of the parties, that it will continue to wear at the relationship. We also need to be honest with ourselves and willing to work on our own toxic behaviors. And lastly, if someone is very mentally unsound and perhaps suffering from a mental or personality disorder, we need to be honest as to whether or not we can remain, especially if that person refuses to be treated – and in some cases (because I see it a lot,) to ask ourselves if we need psychological help…the amount of untreated mental illness out there is sadly staggering, and I see it tear couples up every day, with one party wanting the other to seek needed therapy, (and sometimes the party contacting me refusing to seek therapy despite their partner's requests.) There is nothing wrong with getting therapy. Even if you're mentally sound as can be, it will only help you. 

    Q: I purchased an expensive oil from (company name redacted) on Amazon and it was garbage, but had good reviews – can I get a refund?

    A: I would ask Amazon the refund part, but never buy a large batch oil or powder from any seller, and if they sell items on Amazon, they are already likely too large to make usable oils and powders. Some items like oils must be hand made as they are almost like spells themselves. So if you don't trust a machine to do a love spell, don't trust it to make your ritual oils. 

    Q: I cursed someone a few years ago. While I did hear of some bad luck they had, I lost interest soon after and just let go of the situation and people involved. I didn't hear anything about the person because no mutual connections really remained, I guess. A few months ago, I found out via the LOCAL NEWS of all places that their bad luck continued to spiral and their lives are terrible. When I contacted some mutual connections I"d not really talked to in a few years, I learned the last few years were terrible for this person and kept getting worse and worse until they were in a situation bad enough to be on our local news. I never meant it to go so far, but then I'm not sure if it's my curse? Can you lend insight? I actually feel badly now, and am concerned I did this. 

    A: A friend of mine, when he was a much younger man, got in a fight. My friend is a very muscular and tall person. He looks like a strongman, even now in his middle age. When he was young, he must have been in even better shape, I assume (I met him when he was middle aged.) Well, he hit his opponent just right in that fight, and the other man died. Now my friend is a sweet, kind person, – a truly good friend who has always been the first person to help and not ask for anything in return…just an all around great person. I have never felt he was aggressive or scary in any way. Not even when he told me that story. But…because of a choice he made to get in a fight (hurt someone) that person died. He did not mean for them to die. But they did. And he even served time for it. 

    You made a choice to hurt someone when you cursed them. Now just like my friend, that choice may not have been with the intention of causing as much trouble to them as they got, but there's a strong chance that you magically "hit them just right" and it caused way more damage. Maybe you wanted them to lose an important relationship or job or move and that was just the right place to hit, because it made them fall and keep falling. That thing was the glue holding them up. 

    I'm not saying for sure it was your curse, but it could be. And you will need to accept that. It's perfectly fine to feel badly. BUT if you're not prepared for your curse to exceed your expectations, don't curse people. Just like if you don't understand if you hit someone just right (even if you didn't want to give them more than a black eye,) you can cause permanent damage or even death, then you should not pick a fist fight.

    Instead of beating yourself up over it, you can try to help the person…but chances are the actual curse is long dead. It just triggered a series of really unfortunate events that are continuing to impact the target. This is why I tell people something isn't a nice or a kind spell. Because feeling bad later often is the child of acting on impulse, which means you probably should not have cursed them until you were sure you were willing to accept the consequences that might come with it. 

    It sucks but like my friend above, sometimes intending lesser damage doesn't guarantee that you won't inflict greater, even if you never would have intended to take it so far, and even if you're a genuinely kind and good person otherwise.

    Q: Why is it when I work with a professional, I seem to make them angry by checking in frequently?

    A: While any number of reasons may be the cause, you might remember that every contact you make that requires response is work. So, every time someone needs my attention, the time I spend attending them is technically work, which can add up quickly, as well as be considered disruptive and and rude (for example, frequently using holidays, days off, or bizarre off hours times to contact the worker,) and if it's repetitive (being asked to explain the same thing repeatedly, to comfort or encourage someone frequently,) all the worse. So, I tell people, think of it like dealing with a doctor. If you'd write your doctor ten page novels daily while repeating the same questions over and over and think this person should be comforting and encouraging you while you heal (so in a spellcasters case while you move towards manifestation,) all while several times daily expecting this doctor to spend hours explaining every stupid and fake and wrong thing you found on the internet (and the right answer,) WHILE THIS PERSON HANDLES ALL THEIR OTHER CASES SIMULTANEOUSLY….then…I"d hate to be your doctor, and that isn't appropriate. 

    In reality, every professional has a limited amount of time. This doesn't mean you should not be able to ask questions, or consult if problems and situations arise. This means you should have the courtesy to understand MANY PEOPLE work with this professional and that hiring an expert does not at all suggest you own them or have the right to take over their whole week with often very unnecessary inquiries. It also means you should NEVER expect them to drop every other commitment, case, and aspect of their own personal lives to cater to your needs, regardless of the severity (and with most of these folks it isn't anything severe.)  

    As an expert, I don't need you to check in if nothing is going on, unless nothing has gone on long enough. So if you fail to see improvement in a few weeks, that is actually a thing to bring to my attention. If it hasn't improved in under a week, that is pretty normal. So, telling me every 2 days that nothing is happening is pretty annoying, as you might guess. 

    And the opposing type to this person exists as well… It really isn't helpful if you have problems with the service, the situation, or me, and don't ever bring that to my attention, especially if you bring those problems to anyone else's attention rather than mine. How can I handle something I should be handling (and gladly would,) if it is never brought to my attention? If you complain on any site, forum, or on social media before first attempting to settle it with the person who's services you used, you are your own problem. If I tell Mary that Maggie forgot to return my book, and I suspect on purpose, but fail to inform Mary that I never asked Maggie for my book back, I am vilifying an innocent person. That is the same as complaining about a worker's service to others without ever telling the person you're complaining about that you're unsatisfied and allowing them the opportunity to remedy the issue. Sadly, people who do this don't tend to get very far in life or get the things they want, because they are too afraid to actually handle any problem, and resent the innocent party for there being one only for fear of confronting the issue directly. That's a pretty deep psychological issue, and I hope these types get help rather than continue to alienate, smear, and offend those who never meant them harm. 

    Q: I am in a love triangle – I'm the "third party," as it were, and everyone seems to be against me! Is there any way to remedy this so my friends and loved ones don't view me as the bad guy, and my partner's friends and family accept us?

    A: I recently did some research on my social media about people's opinions of people who try to break up a couple to get one of the partners for themselves, and my research brought me many very descriptive responses detailing that absolutely no one has any respect for (and several people have violent feelings towards,) persons who come between a couple. You're not wrong to think you're fighting an uphill battle in which society thinks you (and possibly the partner you take if you succeed,) are garbage. I'm sure that's a very painful reality to deal with for the third party, and if they succeed in breaking up the couple, the half of the couple who goes off with the third party. 

    The easy answer is don't pursue a person who isn't single. BUT, you already did. :-/ So, I can't give that answer. 

    So, first accept the reality that there are people who will never respect or trust you again. It is what it is. You made a really bad choice, and that's the price of bad choices. Just be glad no one's dead or in jail because bad choices often end that way. 

    The next step is time. You need to stay together with the partner you took, and without vilifying the person or people who you hurt and destroyed their relationship. So the other half of the couple you split up who was removed – they should not be put down. You should show sympathy for them – excluding in an abuse situation, and generally with abuse it is a female who must be the one who left her marriage for another man to get away from an abusive man. If you're a woman who believes she took a man out of an abusive situation, you aren't apt to get sympathy. So, you must show a healthy and good relationship to friends and family, while showing regret and sympathy towards the person you hurt. 

    Magically, you will need to keep your relationship with this person functional (which if we look at percentages, less than 15% of a relationship born of cheating last over a year, and after 5 years it's far far smaller,) while showing regret for the party you hurt. PLUS, do a lot of sweetening on the friends and family. You probably won't win everyone over. Remember the rejected partner may very well have been loved and treasured by friends and family and you and the person you took betrayed them in a terrible way. You need to do sweetening and reconciliation until people forgive you. As for people trusting you? That might take awhile. 

    So, you need to really work on keeping this love relationship functional and visibly so, and there are a lot of spells for that. It probably will require magic as the turmoil that the partner you took will also experience from friends and family will constantly impact the relationship for awhile to come. You should do reconciliation and sweetening on friends and family and for a while to come. Meanwhile, as much as you may resent the person you you stole their partner, you cannot show contempt or aggression, and must instead act sympathetic towards them and regretful for your actions, or else, you merely rile the disrespect, mistrust, and hatred of many around you. 

    If it works out and you stay together, then congratulations for beating the odds (even if you used magic.) If it doesn't, my personal advice is to act as if you don't know either side of the couple nor what anyone's talking about if they bring up didn't you break them up. Honestly, society doesn't view it kindly, and putting distance between yourself and the event will be the best thing you can do.

    And if you're thinking of going after one side of a couple, just don't. Better to spare yourself all of the above than to have to try to live in the mess it causes.

    Hope that was educational,

    ~Cat

  • Every year during December, several people waste my time getting a long consultation and tell me they will pay me next year, usually well after the first of the year. Literally “haha, pay you next year!” Then they get fired before they can hire because working for free for hours isn’t cute or funny. Consultations are work. 

    I also have a lot of paid and paying business you’re stealing time from by being so short sighted and selfish, and frankly, I don’t appreciate you doing that to al the great and awesome people I work for. 

    So if you want to get fired, play that pay you next year card. I have plenty of business and I don’t need yours. I think it’s rude and infantile and frankly, I don’t want to work for people who steal that time from my clients or me because they clearly were not raised right.

    I already have a really heavy work load with a lot of people getting holiday anxieties and depression and needing me more, and so I’m very busy. 

    It’s a rough time of year but if you can’t pay me til next year, kindly get on my radar next year. If you need to wait to pay you can wait to get the consultation, allowing me more time for paying and paid business. If you don’t follow this reminder, I’ll fire before you can hire…unless it’s like the last day of December because thats about the only day “pay you next year” is funny.

    Thanks for understanding,

    ~Cat