How to Become a Witch by Amber K. (large ebook reader txt) 📗

Witchcraft: not what the movies and fantasy novels told us. Obviously no green skin, pointy hats, or soaring across the full moon on your broomstick. No miraculous magickal powers, no constant drama, certainly no evil-sorceress stuff and neither the shriveled, cackling hag nor the voluptuous, eternally sexy dark queen.

Just a lot of real people, walking a different path to Spirit that involves a lot of hard work. It’s not the One True Path, a title which has been claimed by a hundred other religions around the world. There is no one-size-fits-all spiritual truth, not for us little folks circling an average star in a corner of one ordinary galaxy out of millions. How arrogant to believe that our little minds could encompass the whole truth, God-Reality-the-Universe-and-Everything, when most of us can’t even do algebra.

There is no One True Path for all humanity. But there is one that is right for you, that fits your needs and understanding at this time in your life. It might be Witchcraft; it might not. Nobody can decide for you.

You probably do need something, you know. Some kind of religious or philosophical framework that gets you through life, some clear set of beliefs that enables you to play well with others and to like what you see in the mirror. All religions are attempts to provide that and also to give you a chance at reconnecting with what is real and true and good at the heart of things. Don’t we all have a sense of longing, a sense that somewhere everything is the way it should be? That there’s a haven, a sanctuary, in your mother’s lap or your lover’s arms, in heaven or paradise or Summerland, on a distant star or in a dream? And isn’t religion, each religion, just a knapsack of ideas and supplies to help you in your search for that place? And don’t we each travel a different road and need different things on that journey?

Choosing your path is a big deal. Choose wrong, and you’ll spin your wheels in theological mud, get lost on some dead end of conflict and confusion, or mistake the road for the destination.

If you choose Witchcraft, you are choosing a lifestyle, a fluid and evolving set of beliefs and a certain way of understanding and experiencing life. You are also choosing to ally yourself with a community of seekers, all gathered under one banner but each one unique. Some Witches are the finest, truest, best friends and sisters and brothers you could ever hope to walk with—and some are selfish, shallow, irritating creeps that take all the “fun” out of dysfunctional. In other words, they’re human. Just as human as anyone of any faith you might meet anywhere. But most of us, most of the time, are trying our best to become better people.

What is it about Witchcraft that calls to you? Is there something that whispers in your blood, some past-life heritage or ancestral voice that calls you back to the old ways when we were one with earth, blood kin to every creature that runs or flies or swims?

Is it the Goddess and knowing that a woman is so much more than a virgin, a sex kitten, or a bitch? A mighty affirmation that female is sacred, that the mysteries and body-knowing and birthing, creating, nurturing, sustaining, protecting ways of women are the prime and essential core of life. That you, girl, are good ?

Is it the deep certainty that God, the male part of the Divine, is much, much more than either a nice man in a white robe or an evil-tempered tyrant in the sky? That God is and must be the quickening, bright, joyful dancer at the gates of dawn, the loving father and bold explorer and wise healer and a thousand other ways for men to be?

Is it simply this, that sacredness and the heart of creation are in the forests and seas and mountains, that nature is holy everywhere and always, and the books and temples and rules of men are a pale shadow of the power and grace of the earth?

Or is it still deeper and subtler, a sense that the world we see is only a fragment of All That Is, that there are realms and realities beyond this one—in the world of spirit, on the astral planes, in dimensions half-seen by mystics and magicians—that you must explore?

You can still walk away from Witchcraft. There are many excellent spiritual paths and ways of life that can help you grow, enjoy life, and progress toward your destiny. You might be very happy giving your heart to one of the mainstream faiths…or casting aside religion and turning to rational, humanist values…or seeking contentment in your family and career, looking no further than the good things immediately in front of you.

If not—if the moonlight calls you, and you can hear the panpipes and see the flames of the sabbat bonfire dancing—we’ll be waiting in the forest, in a circle near the old oak tree.

Appendix A

Recommended Reading

We have designated the following books as “classics” because of their effect on the Wicca/Witchcraft movement in the past several decades.

Thirteen Classics of

Witchcraft and Wicca

Aradia, or, The Gospel of the Witches by Charles G. Leland (New Page Books, 2003)

Buckland’s Complete Book of Witchcraft by Raymond Buckland (Llewellyn, 1986)

Diary of a Witch by Sybil Leek (Prentice-Hall, 1968)

Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America by Margot Adler (revised and updated; Penguin, 2006)

The God of the Witches by Margaret Murray (NuVision, 2009)

Grimoire of Lady Sheba by Lady Sheba (Llewellyn, 2001)

The Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries by Zsuzsanna Emese Budapest (Susan B. Anthony Coven No. 1, 1979)

The Meaning of Witchcraft by Gerald Gardner (Weiser, 2004)

A New Wiccan Book of the Law by Lady Galadriel (Moonstone Publications, 1992)

The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess by Starhawk (20th anniversary edition; HarperOne, 1999)

Witchcraft for Tomorrow by Doreen Valiente (Robert Hale, 1993)

Witchcraft Today by