This blog is going to be a
bit different than most of those that I post here. Yet it is relevant, I
believe, to the whole of everything I have ever written here. I hope that you
find it relevant to you and that it helps in some small way to bring context to
this thing we call Witchcraft.
The Human Experience
My Witchcraft at the core
is about the Human Experience. Specifically it is about my human experience. So
at the core of my Witchcraft is the context of life—our life. It is not a
matter of adding meaning but of coming to understand the meaning that is
already there. This is the crux of the reality of the mysteries that Witches
are prone to talk about from time to time.
The mysteries can’t be
explained or taught. Only experienced. Yet each of us has the ability to know
the mysteries because they are shared by us. This is why it is said that
Witchcraft has no secrets, only mysteries.
Since my Craft is about my
experience of what it is to be human it has at its foundation the essence of
what it is to be us.
-Biological
One of the big three
things that all humans have is common is that we are biological.
The human experience is
thus one that is physical. It is a shared understanding. I don’t need to
explain what it like to feel hunger, we all have bodies that crave sustenance.
We know what it is to hunger. As such, by mindfully engaging the biological and
physical reality of our experience we likewise directly engage the mysteries
tied to that shared experience.
One of the first things
that I have students do is look at their diet. I don’t advocate any particular
diet over another. It’s not about that. It is about choosing to engage the food
we eat mindful of the physical effects it has upon our experiences. Literally
our choice of diet can change us.
My Craft is one that
purposely applies change by engaging the physical, the experience thereof, and
what it is to be human.
-Symbols
Until fairly recently it
was taught that the thing that separates us from animals is the use of tools.
This is false. Humanity doesn’t have the sole us of tools as part of our
experience. Granted it is a huge part but it isn’t exclusive. The thing that
makes us different is that we symbolize.
The vast array of abstract
human expression is mind blowing. At the same time it is a thing of beauty.
Each and every meaning given to a symbol is the sharing of the experience that
the symbol is tied to. Just as every symbol is multifaceted so too is our
engagement of the symbol.
Just as my Craft is
mindful of the physical, so too do I attempt to be mindful of the symbolic. It
is one of the things that makes us human.
-Groups
There is no shared
understanding without others. This is the third big thing that is shared
amongst humanity. We are human only in the context of groups. Regardless of
whether socially we are outgoing or not, our physiological identities are tied
directly to the relationships we have with others in some shape or fashion.
Once long ago when I was
seeking with a Coven, I was asked why I was seeking membership if I had already
been initiated into a previous Tradition. What I said was, “It is hard to be a
Priest alone.” The existential reality was that I had moved but the human
reality was far deeper.
One of my brothers in the
Craft is fond of the saying, “Witches vote with their feet.” It is about being
decisive, mindful of your various relationships, and choosing to stay or go.
Existential Subjectivity
The rest of my Craft is
subjective to my existential experience. In essence, it is mine. It is these
things though that get the vote of my feet. The why I am here bit.
-Salvation
As I have said elsewhere
in this blog, the only permanence to life is change. It goes without saying
that life is full of joy, pain, ecstasy, fear, and the rest of the range of
human emotion. In all of this, everything I have ever known is different. The
world I knew as a small child is long gone. For that matter, yesterday is but a
memory today. Many friends and family have come and gone through the cycle of
life and death.
This impermanence brings
with it existential dread in any of three ways. I will not claim that they are
universal fears but I will say they come damn close. I am talking about the
dread of death, oblivion, and separation. At some point, most of us have sat at
some point in a place of dread of one of, if not all of, these three.
The Craft is my refuge. By
directly engaging the mysteries via the praxis of the Craft the life context of
these three things is experienced. The Craft allows me to experience the
mysteries of death/oblivion/separation in the here and now. It is not always
easy or pretty. Nor should it be.
-Duty
We all have a duty to
ourselves. I can’t tell you what it is though. I can only talk a bit about its
resemblances. You see it’s because it is one of the mysteries of life.
Our duty it to fulfill us.
It’s a knowing. A knowing of the whole of the now. But it’s not something to be
achieved. There is no goal or place to get to. We are already there and have
been all along. It is our duty to realize this.
The Craft reveals. There
are lots of things that people can say about the nature of the Craft, such as
it being an experiential orthopraxis mystery religion. The result of which is
that it reveals mysteries. It is what it does.
-Transgressive
The Craft exists on the
fringe of society. Being Witchcraft and all this should be no surprise. We deal
directly with the secrets of life that many would prefer not to. We do it on
purpose too.
My Craft is transgressive.
At times it makes me uncomfortable. Sobbing into a plate of food at a Dumb
Supper is no picnic. Other times my heart sings in such ecstatic joy that I
didn’t know it could. In both these ways, and many others, the practice of the
Craft pushes the edge of my experience of the human experience wider.
To me this is what it is
about.
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Sure there are lots of
other fun trappings of the Craft, and I’ve talked about some of those quite a
bit, but this is why I am a Witch.
Boidh Se!
-SM
“Lost is a thicket bare-foot upon a thorned path.”
