Practical Magic: Glamoury and Tealight Hearths

Charms, Hexes, Weeknight Dinner Recipes, Glamoury and Unsolicited Opinions on Morals and Magic

  • Home
    Home This is where you can find all the blog posts throughout the site.
  • Tags
    Tags Displays a list of tags that have been used in the blog.
  • Bloggers
    Bloggers Search for your favorite blogger from this site.
  • Login
    Login Login form

Reframing Your Spiritual Practice

Whenever Jow and I have a moment of time, we like to pretend that we will always have the luxury of time and immediately set about reorganizing our lives, both together and as individuals.  Sometimes it sticks (like we've been cooking more together), sometimes less so (See: Mount St. Laundry in the bedroom).  Inevitably, the conversation will cycle around to how we suck at having a spiritual practice.  We sometimes slap together a pooja to do together, we make offerings of water, light and incense to our goddesses, spirits and ancestors, I make offerings to my Ladies, he meditates sometimes, we do half asleep japa, once in a while we will "whale spout" (a mediation from an old book, I forget the actual name) but it's all v. ad hoc which is v. unsatisfying to Jow.  He wants to treat this like it's the first time he's ever gone on a diet.  Hardcore!  Constant effort!  No excuses!  Other fitspiration here!

Me: That's not going to work.

He: Yes, it will.

Me: Has it worked to date?

He: I can't hear you.

Me: Maybe if you made time on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays when you don't have class, you could then work on your practice in the mornings.  Three times a week is much more regular than zero times a week.

He: I CAN'T HEAR YOU.

Me: . . .like, I just got paid to write a book about getting your shit together? 

Him: *stony silence*

Me: PEOPLE COME TO ME FOR SPIRITUAL ADVICE.  I AM PAID TO GIVE IT.

Him: I want to hear how this will work this time!

Me: It's not gonna work, boo.  You need an actual achievable goal and then work really, really hard to stick the landing on it.  That's it.

Him: Why can't you just tell me what I want to hear?

Me: I am not about that life.

 

I've thinking about it though.  Maybe it's not just about goals and charts and working at your personal practice even when you really don't want to and all that drudgery.  Maybe your spiritual practice shouldn't be focused on tedium.  That doesn't seem like an awesome way to move forward in becoming better connected with your goddesses, spirits and ancestors.  Pretty soon you're all just avoiding each other because who wants to be met with grim faces of determination but obviously wishing that you were doing something, anything else but this?  Your best friend/mother/significant other would not like it, I highly doubt the goddesses, spirits and ancestors are going to be all, oh hooray!  Here's ant 1032294848747347 again making that same damn face about trying to hang out together.  It's okay, ant 1032294848747347!  I'm just happy you showed up.

At least . . .that hasn't been my experience.  I mean, yeah yeah if your faith has a lot of suffering in it, it can sort of be mashed together to work but mostly I think no one really likes being treated like an obligation.

Here's a thought: Instead of constantly throwing yourself at that glass window of whatever you consider is A Serious Practice, how about you reframe it with things you actually enjoy doing?  So much of how we present ourselves to ourselves and others is based on how we frame things in our heads.  Which isn't depressing: (a) I'm a sexy zaftig person who can drop it like it's hot or (b) I'm so fat, I'm so hideous and I'm inherently unlovable to others because of it?  So if your head is filled with more than b it's much easier to go about your daily business.  Maybe you will never, ever have two hours a day to meditate.  Why?  Because you hate it.  Who wants to do anything for two hours a day that they hate?  No one.  You can keep banging your head against That Thing in Your Practice You Hate Doing for, like, enlightenment or whatever (which is a valid choice if that's something super important to you but it's not all that important to me personally) ooooooooooor you can reframe

For example, I was recently at a Pagan Pride.  The "obvious" spiritual choice for me would be for me to participate in the main public rituals.  Except, I hate outdoor public rituals.  I can never hear anything, I'm never sure what's going on because it's usually not my tradition and I don't want to drink out of a cup with like twenty to fifty strangers.  Pass.  I feel like getting my ass up at 5:30am before the sun even got his ass out of bed should count for something.  I feel like paying my table fee to support Pride should count for something.  I feel like putting in all of that time and effort to make my shop look magical and pretty only to take it down in ten hours should count for something.  I feel like lugging all my wares across a trolley track should count for something.  I feel like smiling and being kind to whoever enters my shop even when I am tired of interacting, should count for something.  I feel like taking the shop down and going home after the sun went to sleeps, should count for something.  Because let's be really real here, Charmers: no one makes a fortune just by selling handmade goods at local events and Etsy.  Trufax!  At this point, I go almost more for arranging flowers at the farmer's market to take home, the food trucks, the friends I've made, getting dressed up, the mushrooms from the farmer's market and to leave the house than I do for the cash.  The cash is good, I like getting it but it is not so impressive that it is worth doing all this in and of itself for.

Doesn't being in service to your local spiritual community count as part of one's practice?  Jow thinks no because there's more shlepping and less incense, but I think yes.  All of that work should count for something.

What about in service to your neighborhood?  There was a little girl on our block who liked to look at the Buddha who lives under our bushes and liked to look at the bird seed blocks.  I finally had a moment to breathe and I decided it would be a good thing to create something for the sake of creating which would recharge my batteries and is an offering to my goddesses and spirits because I am creating glamour/beauty for the sake of creating it instead of trying to live off of it.  So I spent an hour and a half at Michaels to find all the goods I needed to create a tiny fairyland for about $20.  I then built it, as pictured and put it under the shrubs, slashing away at thorn bushes.  It's an offering to our local land spirits and our local tiny people who have squealed a lot while passing.  And I think that's worth something too. 

 

 

Last modified on
Deborah Castellano's book, Glamour Magic: The Witchcraft Revolution to Get What You Want (Llewellyn, 2017) is available: https://www.amazon.com/Glamour-Magic-Witchcraft-Revolution-What/dp/0738750387 . She is a frequent contributor to Occult/Pagan sources such as the Llewellyn almanacs, Witchvox, PaganSquare and Witches & Pagans magazine. She writes about Charms, Hexes, Weeknight Dinner Recipes, Glamoury and Unsolicited Opinions on Morals and Magic at Charmed, I'm Sure. Her craft shop, The Mermaid and The Crow (www.mermaidandcrow.com) specializes in goddess & god vigil candles, hand blended ritual oils, airy hand dyed scarves, handspun yarn and other goodies. She resides in New Jersey with her husband, Jow and their two cats. She has a terrible reality television habit she can't shake and likes St. Germain liquor, record players and typewriters.

Comments

Additional information