Everything Under the Moon

It may not be the smartest way to go about things but it's how I'd prefer to

There are lots of Witches who do not call on a thing, it's just their way. No worries there mate!
I've always been of a mind that energy is universal. One does have personal energy, but we use the universal energy to flow through us rather than taking our own energy out and away during work. I believe that is the main reason folks feel drained after doing their craft is releasing too much personal energy and not refilling with universal energy, then properly grounding to balance it all again.
bb, FF

firebirdflys wrote:There are lots of Witches who do not call on a thing, it's just their way. No worries there mate!

Yeah we learn to be carefree as we enjoy the nature's lovely dance.

ThunderFog, you seem to me like a kind of very bright spirit. As a young man you probably tend to analyse, rationalize, categorize a lot.
I guess I've been like that too but later it came to great Castaneda quote "things just get way more simple when you learn to see the flow of energy directly."
Meaning not mandatory to see like aura seeing, might as well be sufficient to use the word 'perceive'.

I think calling me bright might be a bit of an overestimation of my intelligence but thank you for the compliment anyway

Wizards, witches, warlocks, wicca, e.t.c. come from the same etymological roots that later became associated with magical powers and occult sciences. Traditionally "witches" became known as the anti-social ones on the fringes of society that practiced malicious and harmful magic, but contemporary modern witchcraft has come to encompass the helpful, healing, and charming low magic elements of the cunning folk as well, also within the traditional and religious pagan witchcraft traditions today. Wizards seem to be more associated with the high magic practices of sorcery, conjuring, and other ceremonial magics.

Druids were the learned castes of Celtic society, not only priests, and magicians, but lawyers, judges, doctors, e.t.c. During the romantic neo-druidic revival interest in those pre-Christian (though the early modern druids were Christian) practices became the focal point, and druids today are religious and magical practitioners that come from the Celtic worldviews.

Bard (the storyteller, musician, poet and such), Ovate (divination, magician, dream interpreter, communicate with Deities, spirits of the land, etc) and Druid (teacher, philosopher). The three overlap and the one I resonate with the most is Ovate. I have used energy for healing and banishing with help from various invisible beings. I've had contact and communication with the same kind of beings. I consider some of them to be my familiars. Since I joined this site to learn spell casting, I have cast a couple of spells which seem to be effective. So yeah, most of what I do on my path labels me as an Ovate.

Wizards, if they call themselves such, tend to go more towards hermetic magic and other structures. My husband identifies as wizard and his rituals are always planned out very well, while I prefer on-the-spot adaptions. Mages are more on the spot in my experience,too, but then people call themselves all sorts of things nowadays.

But yes it gets confusing.

"people call themselves all sorts of things nowadays"
How about what other people call you?

For instance, I used to be called a socialised commie liberal. I didn't see myself as that image. With ZERO change in my values and--from one wave of the wand--I'm now called a dangerous, alt-right radical. Again, I don't see myself as that image.

Fascinating world!

It documents that the world changes, and people stay the same. My intermix bloodline allows me to see Native Americans were the same old people as the ones who replaced them; simply, people don't change.

A good example, Chwpym said,
"Look what happened to Our Land the last time the floodgates were opened."

I believe in magic. Why I'm expected to take a label is beyond me, the reason I have stayed detached from labels since I finally accepted the facts that support the existance of magic. Wearing a label as an order or rank. It's the same as saying someone who adds a 'k' to the spelling of magic weilds more power.

Mr Crowley wrote:It documents that the world changes, and people stay the same. My intermix bloodline allows me to see Native Americans were the same old people as the ones who replaced them; simply, people don't change.

I feel the reason people need a "label" is to tidy things up. It's just human nature to want to know what's in the package, if it has a great little name we don't necessarily need to open up that package, because we are pre-decided on what it means. Maybe that's where we are blocked to change, the un imaginative can't see things another way. And if it ain't broke don't fix it.
I personally am tired of the minutia of labels. I rarely use my title of High Priestess, because...so what? Yea, I trained but in the end I am just a worker of the will, like anyone else who is serious about their craft. Wicca opened the door for many a will worker to wake up to the world of "magic" "k" and then they had to call it a name because Wicca was too, too, too what ever it was they disagreed about that title, yet it created a huge door for these folks to create their titles.
To top it off we have the extremist's who scream cultural appropriation yet it is perfectly fine to appropriate a gender. In my opinion if cultures wish to remain pure, they better find another planet, because we are all related, like it or not you have no control over who you great, great, great grand who ever slept with. We are already a intermingled breed. Give it another 100 years (if we make it that far) and they will be teaching the histories of the original races and how their cultural ideologies died out because they were unwilling to share/teach for fear of ...what? Ok, used for financial gain, I get that... it sucks, wrong information, well...not if it were taught on a wider level. but remember this "the more you tighten your grip, the more the star systems will slip through your fingers" = the more you hold on to something you fear loosing the more you are pushing it away.
annnnnnd, I'm sure I'm repeating this notion that magic with a k is a literary cue to differentiate slight of hand magic from the kind that workers of the will do. Eh, spelling... another weirdly morphing thing.
We really are all just people, we really are all related, we really all have different interests. Cool.

Mr Crowley wrote:It documents that the world changes, and people stay the same. My intermix bloodline allows me to see Native Americans were the same old people as the ones who replaced them; simply, people don't change.

So true. Food n' sex all the way. More poetical way'd be to say one can't overstep his own shadow.

firebirdflys wrote: I rarely use my title of High Priestess, because...so what?

Why not it's just so on spot. If you want some respect for women just do that. There's a ton of male priests spelled in news everyday. ... that'd be a nice newspaper slogan: "High priestess and priestesses of the Moon performed Sun-Moon union rite and it was amazing."

firebirdflys wrote:annnnnnd, I'm sure I'm repeating this notion that magic with a k is a literary cure to differentiate slight of hand magic from the kind that workers of the will do. Eh, spelling... another weirdly morphing thing.
We really are all just people, we really are all related, we really all have different interests. Cool.

Lol I've been thinking about that phrase before I finished reading your post.
I call it magic because sleight of hand wit or illusionism is just that. Therefore magic is magic. Though it's true that I am never forced to suffer the common slang amongst native speakers. I think the 'k' in the end is a bit of an expression of being 'pretentious'.

Mr Crowley wrote:"people call themselves all sorts of things nowadays"
How about what other people call you?

People call me a weirdo because I am autistic, and also because I talk to animals (or they to me) and sometimes plants and I mostly understand them.

Me and my fiance talk to animals too, to a degree like we can usually get the general idea of what they want

Animals sense emotion of intent.
I want to harm or you
or I want to cooperate.
Communication simplified.