I keep getting mail
from people asking where to start and so I decided to put together a
little guide to help you out. Sorry for the bluntness. I haven’t eaten. This IS NOT aimed at anyone. I’d just like to have a thing on the blog.
1. What the hell do you want?
The issue I run into the most with the “how do I get started question?” is that it’s the wrong question. No matter who you are or what you’re doing if you ask me this question I’m going to roll my eyes and go eat a sandwich and do laundry or something before coming back to your question.
The correct question is: “I want to achieve X. What is the right way of approaching X?”
Have you ever told your parent that you’re hungry and they told you that there was something in the fridge, but that’s not the thing you want? That’s what you do every time you ask me “how to get started”.
Along the same lines are:
-I want to be powerful
-I want to change my life
-I want to help my family
-I want to be … . magical
Concrete goals are your friend, friend. I want to be powerful should probably be “I want to become really strong in manipulating weather” or “I want to become really adept at controlling luck” or “I want to get really good at dream … things.”
If you have a concrete goal, then you already have a compass. No matter what my answer to you will always be:
2. What the hell do you need?
I don’t know you, human. I don’t know what you have at your disposal. I don’t know what kind of psychological hangups you have or physical plane non-sense you have to deal with.
If “how do I start” really means, “how do I start practicing magic without my highly strict, Evangelical parents finding out?” then just say that. I can help with the second one. I have no clue what you want with the first one.
This one falls in line with the first bullet point. You have to know what you need to get done in order to get started. If you need to gain confidence, there’s a spell for that. If you need to know what a rose quartz does, there’s a guide for that. If you need to know what white feathers mean in dreams, there’s a dictionary for that.
Ask yourself, what do you need?
3. What the hell do you have?
Look around you. What is magical in your space at the moment? If you say nothing, I am not the witch you should be asking questions.
4. Why the hell?
Why do you want to learn magic? “Because it sounds cool” is totally a legit response, but it doesn’t help me help you. I can give you tips on some cool things. I mean there are like three posts on random shit you can do with your aura. I’m not an uptight cat. I get “cool”.
But you’re going to have to focus on a thing. A specific thing. Specific things, even.
5. Who the hell?
Authors? Books? St. don’t know nothin’ about no books. Seriously, most of the commercial New Age section says the same thing over and over anyway.
No really. There are blogs for that.
No … I don’t know which blogs.
6. Where the hell?
You might want to start local. I think that there’s a bit of fear mongering that goes on in the Tumblr witchy community about misinformation. While that is true, and there is a lot of misinformation out there, a good portion of it is pretty harmless. We’re not talking about cultural appropriation, or the fact that people don’t have enough sense to look up the toxicity of the stones and herb. We’re talking about the arguments about whether or not compass direction East is water or air. Or if the tarot suit of swords is fire and wands are air (spoiler: it depends on the deck and the deck’s artist).
Go meet your local witchy community if you’re so inclined. You can even go and meet your online witchy community.
I am not the witchy community. I am a bitter, old hag who has nothing to offer but dark humor, snark, and weird peppermint candy that randomly appears at the bottom of my purse. Every once and a while, I have a tip to keep you motivated.
Get off my lawn!
7. When the hell?
Seriously. Just Google time correspondence and look at a few charts and make comparisons. There’s nothing wrong with that.
If your “when” is a “Am I too young/old?” I ’m going to shrug at you. That’s not mine to decide.
****
TL;DR : Ask me specific questions that aren’t about giving you a spell and I’ll give you a nice specific answer. I’m not a teacher. I don’t really like teaching. I’m not going to hold your hand. Google is your friend. There are a ton of really helpful people online who are better and more helpful that me. I suck at being patient with novices.
The best questions to ask me are probably about technique, because that’s not something discussed often. Otherwise, there are charts for what ails you.
1. What the hell do you want?
The issue I run into the most with the “how do I get started question?” is that it’s the wrong question. No matter who you are or what you’re doing if you ask me this question I’m going to roll my eyes and go eat a sandwich and do laundry or something before coming back to your question.
The correct question is: “I want to achieve X. What is the right way of approaching X?”
Have you ever told your parent that you’re hungry and they told you that there was something in the fridge, but that’s not the thing you want? That’s what you do every time you ask me “how to get started”.
Along the same lines are:
-I want to be powerful
-I want to change my life
-I want to help my family
-I want to be … . magical
Concrete goals are your friend, friend. I want to be powerful should probably be “I want to become really strong in manipulating weather” or “I want to become really adept at controlling luck” or “I want to get really good at dream … things.”
If you have a concrete goal, then you already have a compass. No matter what my answer to you will always be:
Pick a direction and go. Figure out what interests you the most about what you consider to be magical/witchy and study that until it forks off into a different magical/witchy thing. In a few years, you’ll have a practice.But it all starts with a concrete goal.
2. What the hell do you need?
I don’t know you, human. I don’t know what you have at your disposal. I don’t know what kind of psychological hangups you have or physical plane non-sense you have to deal with.
If “how do I start” really means, “how do I start practicing magic without my highly strict, Evangelical parents finding out?” then just say that. I can help with the second one. I have no clue what you want with the first one.
This one falls in line with the first bullet point. You have to know what you need to get done in order to get started. If you need to gain confidence, there’s a spell for that. If you need to know what a rose quartz does, there’s a guide for that. If you need to know what white feathers mean in dreams, there’s a dictionary for that.
Ask yourself, what do you need?
3. What the hell do you have?
Look around you. What is magical in your space at the moment? If you say nothing, I am not the witch you should be asking questions.
4. Why the hell?
Why do you want to learn magic? “Because it sounds cool” is totally a legit response, but it doesn’t help me help you. I can give you tips on some cool things. I mean there are like three posts on random shit you can do with your aura. I’m not an uptight cat. I get “cool”.
But you’re going to have to focus on a thing. A specific thing. Specific things, even.
5. Who the hell?
Authors? Books? St. don’t know nothin’ about no books. Seriously, most of the commercial New Age section says the same thing over and over anyway.
No really. There are blogs for that.
No … I don’t know which blogs.
6. Where the hell?
You might want to start local. I think that there’s a bit of fear mongering that goes on in the Tumblr witchy community about misinformation. While that is true, and there is a lot of misinformation out there, a good portion of it is pretty harmless. We’re not talking about cultural appropriation, or the fact that people don’t have enough sense to look up the toxicity of the stones and herb. We’re talking about the arguments about whether or not compass direction East is water or air. Or if the tarot suit of swords is fire and wands are air (spoiler: it depends on the deck and the deck’s artist).
Go meet your local witchy community if you’re so inclined. You can even go and meet your online witchy community.
I am not the witchy community. I am a bitter, old hag who has nothing to offer but dark humor, snark, and weird peppermint candy that randomly appears at the bottom of my purse. Every once and a while, I have a tip to keep you motivated.
Get off my lawn!
7. When the hell?
Seriously. Just Google time correspondence and look at a few charts and make comparisons. There’s nothing wrong with that.
If your “when” is a “Am I too young/old?” I ’m going to shrug at you. That’s not mine to decide.
****
TL;DR : Ask me specific questions that aren’t about giving you a spell and I’ll give you a nice specific answer. I’m not a teacher. I don’t really like teaching. I’m not going to hold your hand. Google is your friend. There are a ton of really helpful people online who are better and more helpful that me. I suck at being patient with novices.
The best questions to ask me are probably about technique, because that’s not something discussed often. Otherwise, there are charts for what ails you.
