Candle Magic Superstitions

I enjoy candle magic.  I find it very straight forward and very versatile. I don't hold much with certain superstitions attached to candle magic, however. I've always been of the opinion that the intent and level of respect is what counts. After all, if I blow the candle out, am I "blowing away" and wasting the energy, or am I sending the energy off to do my will upon my breath? Is it more rude to put out the candle with the air element (blowing it out) than it is with the earth element (using a snuffer)? Wouldn't snuffing (earth element) be like grounding, therefore dissipating the energy? See, I can create superstitions, too! :D

In terms of candle health, it's best to re-wax the wick after putting out the candle by dipping the wick into the pool of melted wax after you put it out, so that could be the origin of the superstition that the fire element and/or the spirits will be offended if you blow out the candle.  If the wick is not re-waxed, then it will have no protection from any moisture that gets on the wick, and an even slightly damp wick will have difficulty being re-lit. Even heavy humidity in the air can make a wick difficult to light.

Of course, using a snuffer doesn't automatically re-wax the wick, either. Some people just smash the snuffer down onto the candle, and that can sometimes re-wax it a little, but not much and not always. Others hold the snuffer just above the flame without it touching the wax so that it burns up the oxygen under the bell and goes out, basically suffocating the flame, which to me is the same as blowing it out. Also, using a snuffer in this way creates as much or more smoke as blowing it out.

My favorite candles to use are votive candles in glass votive holders. Once the candle gets going, the wax drips into the sides, creating a mini jar candle in a way. This helps the candle last longer. When I want to put it out, I'll just take a snuffer and use the handle end, or the handle end of a spoon or fork, and put out the candle by dipping the wick straight into the melted wax. This re-waxes the wick and also keeps the candle from smoking, which I tend to be allergic to anyway. Then, I'll use the handle to make sure the wick is standing upright again so it'll dry upright and be easier to light next time. There are also specialty tools for this that you can get from some candle shops, though any long, heavy gauge wire with the last 1/2 inch bent at a 90 degree angle works just as well.

All that is harder to do with taper candles unless they are of a large diameter, but you can still kind of do it by mashing the wick down onto the top of the candle, especially once it has burned down to the wider section, or else if it's the same diameter the whole length, like the stick candles we've nicknamed "witch sticks" that you can get from most new age shops and online occult supply stores
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Secret Teachings

Very often, the seeker of spirituality is lured in by promises of secret knowledge, secret power.  Seekers come from all walks of life, but there are commonalities.  The empty, hollow feeling; the need for connection and meaning; the desire to know that there is more to life; the need for everlasting peace; the desire to control the direction of their lives; and upon the cold, wine-dark sea, they will grasp at whatever driftwood seems to promise those things to them.

Some seekers believe they have found what they were seeking after.  They gather knowledge.  They gather rituals.  They gather secret names, motions, and symbols.  Some begin to feel a bit special for all of this; Indeed, not many wouldn't.  As special beings, is it not up to them, therefore, to make sure the "lineage stays pure"?  Is it not up to them to make sure that those to whom they pass on this hard-won knowledge (i.e. usually the price of a few books of new age and/or acedemic provenance) are worthy of such?  So, make sure you stroke their egos.  Make sure you pay your dues, or your seminar fees, or your initiation fees, or your church tithes.  If you don't...maybe you'll find that you by chance aren't worthy of the secrets, of the rituals, the initiations, names and symbols.  You poor, spiritually undeveloped soul, you.  Maybe by next incarnation you'll have learned enough to be ready for the SECRETS....

It should be apparent from what I've written above that I most certainly believe that the knowledge should be available to all, and certainly not suppressed and yet, I suppose I'm in the camp that some would call "exclusionary" or even "elitist", but by observation, not by choice, decision, or mere opinion.  If everyone were meant to do it, it would work for everyone, but it doesn't.  How many people pick up some aspect of the occult, any aspect, and stick with it?  How many does it work for?  Those factors are just as much a part of the mechanism that keeps these things "secret" as them being deliberately kept secret, if not more so. In China, businesses have never *stopped* consulting a feng shui expert.  That doesn't mean everyone *practices* feng shui any more than taking communion makes every Catholic a priest.  Is the occult more accepted in the West today?  Sure.

But we don't have to keep secrets.  The secrets keep themselves.

The only real secrets aren't secrets at all, because they can be neither withheld nor doled out by any human. They are, and have always been, spirit-taught. The first shaman knew this, and so does anyone else with *actual* spiritual attainment.  Knowledge, power, peace and all the rest don't come from a book, or a seminar, or a teacher, or a church, or a secret society or mystery cult.  Anything else purported to be a "secret" is nothing more than culturally developed window dressing.  A good teacher can give you methods to get to the door leading to the experience.  A great teacher then gets out of your way so you can walk through the door.

But will you walk through it?  And once through it, will you stay on the path?  Or will you keep yourself from the secret?...

Pendulum Energy Work

I study the phenomenon variously known as ley lines, faerie trods, or dragon line/paths/roads.  Though these can be described by different cultures in different ways, I will describe it thus:

Spiritual energy runs, swirls, and pools throughout the universe, throughout the world, and through and in all life in the Universe.  The Chinese might call this Qi or Ch'i.  The Japanese call it Ki, the Hawaiians would call it Mana.  It is the Prana of Hinduism and Buddhism.  The Anglo-Saxons called it Maegen, as in "might and main", i.e. physical and spiritual strengths. The Romans would have known it as numen, and the Greeks, Pneuma. Some traditions of Druidry call it Nwyfre.

This energy tends to run in veins across the earth, pooling in various "places of power", and it does the same thing in the human body, whence come the concepts of chakras, pressure points and acupuncture, etc.

To wit, here are some ideas for exercises one can do with a pendulum, a weight of natural material suspended on a thread or chain of natural material:

Pendulum exercises

SETTING UP YOUR PENDULUM:

• make it swing on purpose: clockwise, stop, counterclockwise, stop, back and forth, stop, left and right, stop
• show me neutral, show me yes, show me no, show me confusion/ wrong question
• always only ask yes/no questions

EXERCISES WITH AN ASSISTANT:

Have a friend set these experiments up so that you don't know ahead of time which is which, then use the pendulum, asking yes/no questions to determine which is which.

• 2 glasses of water, tap and bottled
• 3 glasses of water: plain, salted, sugared, find each mineral
• 2 coins, same date and denomination
• 2 coins same date, different denomination or vice versa
• 3 coins, 2 same and 1 different
• row of cards, find the red one, etc
• row of court cards, find the king etc
• 3 cups, find the coin
• 3 cups; 3 coins, find each coin
• friend thinks of object in house or yard, find out what it is
• friend hides an object in house, etc
• use maps to find things

USE PENDULUM TO DETERMINE DATE/TIME:

• use calendar and clock to find date something happened/ will happen by pointing to each date and hour.

ASKING A SPIRIT QUESTIONS:

• draw 170 degree fan charts with choices about a subject, such as the alphabet to ask spirits questions like a talking board, or two or more choices. A chart of 180 degrees or more could cause confusion about which letter the pendulum was swinging towards.

• hold pendulum over chakras to determine if out of balance/blocked. An clear chakra should cause the pendulum to circle clockwise, or sometimes counterclockwise, while a blocked or limited chakra usually causes the pendulum to swing in a straight line or to hold still.

FOR DOWSING:

• finding water, ley lines, oil, metals, lost objects, people, etc

~ divide an area into grids and pointing to each grid on a map, rule out each grid until you find the object
~ use triangulation to pinpoint
~ turn in direction of circular swings to face correct direction to find something
~ for depth start by standing over the spot; walk away until the pendulum swings (or stops swinging). The number of feet you've walked away from the spot is how many feet down the object is

• predict weather (National Weather Service is supposedly only 30% accurate)

• 4 elements:
Deosil - air, sanguine
widdershins - water, phlegmatic
horizontal - earth, melancholic
vertical - fire, choleric

•4 humors also, for diagnosis of physical, emotional, mental and spiritual ailments

Weather Work

I live on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. It is a great place to live, for the most part. An hour from New Orleans, a little more than that to Mobile. There is a quaint charm to my small town, and the French colonial culture still lingers, lending a rich history. The weather is pretty darn great, too. We have long summers to enjoy our beaches, ample rainfall without usually getting drowned out, and mild short winters. There are no blizzards. There are no mudslides. There are no earthquakes, volcanoes or tsunamis. Tornados typically do not form here in the 3 mile wide strip of land south of Interstate 10. But we do have hurricanes.

Back in 2005, we had the mother of all hurricanes come through. Katrina. That name will forever haunt an entire generation of coastians. You see, New Orleans may have gotten the coverage because their levies broke an hour after the storm had passed, but they were 40 miles from the eye of the storm, on its weaker west side, while my town was 20 miles from the eye on the stronger east side of the storm. So I know a thing or two about what weather is capable of doing.

One aspect of any "magical" path that is mentioned often is the ability to influence the weather. From the witches of Europe, to the shamans of Siberia and the medicine men of Native America, the ability to influence the weather for good or ill has been a common feature of sorcerers, magicians and shamans the world over.

We don't live in a vacuum. Everything we do, everything, has consequences, both good and bad, and this applies to our physical actions (and inactions) just as much as our "magical" ones. Our responsibility when working with the weather comes foremost in trying our best to determine what effect we will have on not only our community but also adjacent communities and indeed, the entire world.

With this in mind, one must think long and hard about performing weather work, and only doing so in situations of true need. But the responsibility does not end there.

While it should go without saying that to push a storm away from you and yours is unethical because it will mean pushing it towards others, I'd like to tell you about another unethical practice. I remember many years ago, when another hurricane threatened our shores, that one group of practitioners, and I don't remember if they were wiccans or druids or what they called themselves, decided for all the community that they felt *we* could handle the storm better than the Florida community to which the storm was apparently headed, so what did they do? They performed a rite to draw the storm to us! Thankfully, most practitioners were working to weaken the storm, so when it did arrive on our beaches it was not so strong.

Hurricanes are needed. They provide a release for the energies building up in the world's oceans. Without this release, things could get much worse. Hurricanes also bring much needed rain to land and they also help to cool the blistering summer in many places. These things are needed.

We should not try to avert weather conditions, in my opinion, unless lives are at stake, and I don't just mean human lives. We might save a human, and in the process kill thousands of marine and land plants and animals. If you think that won't create a debt for you, my personal belief is that you are sorely mistaken.

This past weekend we had another small storm come through, tropical storm Karen. I saw the usual rhyming spell passed around asking for the storm to be weakened, but I have recently been working more animistically on purpose, so I thought I'd take another approach.

The fox is an amazing animal, and it has much to teach one who would be open to receive its wisdom. Even studying the physical habits of animals will yield much wisdom that can be applied to one's daily life, as well as to one's spiritual practice. One thing the fox is known for is creating caches of food to save for later. Their stomachs are not very large compared to the rest of their body, so they kill or scavenge food and hide it, to return to it later when they have less luck.

I decided to utilize this to my advantage and at the same time, try to weaken the storm. After speaking to the spirit of the storm and asking to have some of its energy, I asked fox to nip away bits of the storm's energy and save it for later, to cache the bits away safely so that we could have use of them later. After the storm I did a divination to see how many caches of power she had acquired, and how powerful they were, and I am very pleased with the results.

You will never hear me being so pompous as to say that I am the reason the storm weakened before it came ashore, but I do feel that I contributed in some small part to make it safer for everyone, while also allowing the storm to take its course and expend its energy, while not taking too much.