Hexing-Healing: Witches Not Limited To One-Sided Coin

Hexing (which for most people includes binding, banishing, or cursing –among other things) and healing (physical, emotional, spiritual, relational, etc). Topics that can incite strong reactions among Witches, Wiccans, Pagans, and other magickal practitioners when brought up in conversation (or blog posts expressing a political view).

Raising questions such as: Is it proper for a Witch to hex? Can hexing be a form of protection, a way to seek justice, or should it be avoided altogether as causing “harm”?

Is healing always right for every situation? Are healing and hexing mutually exclusive? Should a Witch or magickal practitioner only perform one or the other? Can a Witch both hex and heal?

Hexing/Healing: Two Sides of the Same Coin

Everyone has a perspective that informs their witchcraft and how they practice it. In my view, hexing and healing are a part of witchcraft. Nothing more. Nothing less. One is not greater or lesser (lighter or darker) than the other, despite what some teachings might have you believe. You can look at them as different styles of spellcraft but to me, it’s all just witchcraft.

Martha Kirby Capo (The Corner Crone) wrote a beautiful piece about this as an addendum to articles that focus on politics, witchcraft/paganism, and Trump. Posts, such as this one from Tea Addicted Witch, causing quite a furor on the Patheos Pagan Facebook page.

But Martha is looking at the issue from a different perspective. She is now wondering what will happen after the election? Asking where and how does the healing in our country begin when the dust settles, regardless of the outcome? Will those of us who have been focusing on one type of magick have the energy to put toward healing? Will we even want to go there?

A Witch Who Can’t Hex Can’t Heal

In And After The Election? Then What?, Martha also writes from the perspective that hexing is as much the same witchcraft as healing. She cites an excellent post by Cyndi Brannen, who offers many points including that magick has no “color.” Something I’ve always believed as well.

The intention is the driving factor of any spell, determined by the motivation of the Witch or magickal practitioner. And unless you know or can read a person’s mind and heart, you cannot know the intention or motivation behind their witchcraft.

People often make snap judgments or assumptions when it comes to baneful magick. There is an expectation of dark intent or harm against an individual. But this is a stereotype about witchcraft (or Witches in general) as viewed by the world. Do we really need to be using these misconceptions against one another as well?

 Magick Has Teeth However You Use It

In Green Witchcraft: Using Magick with Teeth, I make a similar argument that within nature, there are plants that can be used for both healing or harming. How one applies the properties of the plant or herb is what determines the outcome.

Beauty and danger live side by side in nature —sometimes within the same vessel. Foxglove is a toxic plant that people plant in their gardens. Extreme care must be taken in handling it for this reason. Yet, it is a source of heart medicine for those trained to use it– digitalis. Not to mention, many experienced Witches use foxglove in their spellcraft and ritual.

As mentioned in Binding Trump Is Part of My Work As A Witch, a binding is meant to prevent someone from doing harm to others by holding their influence or actions at bay. This does not mean harm comes to the individual being bound. And depending on the situation, a binding can act as healing for those who are being protected through the binding.

A Witch Who Can Hex Can Heal

A Witch does not have to choose between hexing (example: binding or cursing Trump ) or prayers and spells of peace.  They can do both. Unless they feel called to make the choice. Nor should they be judged by whichever spell they choose to perform whether it be hexing or healing. There’s room for both points of view. I’m a Witch who practices both hexing and healing, and there are many others who do as well.

So, I will continue my work to Bind Trump. But I will also perform a Blue Wave Spell, along with the one already working to protect the election from outside influences. There are protection spells for Joe Biden and Governor Whitmer, one to seek justice for the marginalized, and healing for our nation and communities.

If I haven’t driven the point home, I’ll say it again. I believe there is room in a Witch’s practice to do hexing and healing for those who have the will and desire to do so. As always, the choice is up to the individual. And in the end, isn’t that the point of witchcraft?