Here's three things about witchcraft that I wish I'd learned much earlier on my journey.
Feel good is not the same as does good
I've been doing a lot of transcendental meditations for the past couple of years. Getting in touch with Source, feeling the Divine Love of the Universe. And they felt amazing. I felt loved and soothed and a part of the Universe again. And I would recommended a little of the practice - but only a little.
Once you're enlightened, it's very easy to go into that space at every opportunity. It's sexy and delightful and soothing all at once. But that Divine love does love everyone and everything, and if you're looking to grow as a person then transcendental work can lead you the wrong way.
We live in a material world like Madonna said, and if the purpose of enlightenment was to stay in the light at all times then we'd achieve it and immediately shoot out of our bodies. But we don't. We stick around for many more decades, which implies there's something left to do on Earth.
I am a very dreamy person and struggle to remain bodied as it is. By not being here and handing judgement over the Universe 100% of the time, I was not learning my Earthly lessons. As amazing as daily transcendental work felt, it did not do me any good.
2. Suffering does not equal success
On the flip side of that coin, we have this false belief that to do good work we must necessarily be working hard or that to be a healer we must be wounded. Whilst it's true that the best healers have been wounded, you do not need to be wounded right now. And often when we think things are too easy, we're simply just good at them and have internalised the process.
It's like driving a car - when you first start driving you have to mentally go through each step in your head. When you are a competent driver, some days you just arrive at your destination and have no real memory or struggle of getting there. Do you somehow not deserve to be where you drove because you didn't 'work hard' to get there?
You can work very hard at something and be great. You can work very hard at something and still terrible. Sometimes you need something else instead of hard work, like community support, or a nap, or a better process.
3. Don't rely on one tool
There is no need (or time enough in your life) to learn every type of witchcraft/divination/magic in the world, but you do need to have a range of skills and tools at your disposal. 'At your disposal' can mean tools and skills you yourself have, or it can mean using skilled practitioners who have mastered skills you don't have yet or don't want to have.
Most of the mistakes I've made over the past three years have been using a style and a tool of magic for every problem I've come across, and it didn't work. Part of the issue was because I was in a cult who was very much of the 'if it didn't work you did it wrong' mentality.
The idea that you wouldn't sew a dress with a hammer was one that was hard-wrested from the 'teacher' and little was done to address the imbalance. In fact, can I change the title of this section to 'Don't rely on one anything?' One of the reasons I was able to get out of said cult is because I had read other books from other people and noticed how small my worldview had become.
Don't rely on one teacher. Don't rely on one form of magic. I know the saying goes that only a shoddy workman blames his tools, but you can have the best hammer in the world and the best sewing skills and still be unable to sew a dress with it. If it's not working, maybe it's NOT you - or your shadow, or your Higher Self telling you not to do it. Maybe you just need to change your approach.
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