Hopefully you\u2019ve made good use of your time over the past few years and you\u2019ve developed some skill with magic. If you haven\u2019t, start now. While skills are best developed in a low-risk environment (if you need to learn to drive, start practicing in an empty parking lot and not on an expressway at rush hour) there\u2019s nothing like urgent deep need to power a spell.<\/p>\n
There are numerous books that teach numerous different magical techniques and traditions. The best book for these times is Blackthorn\u2019s Protection Magic: A Witch\u2019s Guide to Mental and Physical Self-Defense<\/em><\/a>. If you\u2019re looking for instruction, my on-line, on-demand course in Operative Magic<\/a> is the most popular of all the Under the Ancient Oaks classes.<\/p>\n Basic defensive magic is both essential and effective. I begin every day with a simple grounding and shielding exercise. I have wards on my house. I use regular divination to see what threats may be out there that I need to be concerned with. If basic defensive magic isn\u2019t enough, there are more aggressive approaches<\/a> available.<\/p>\n All this is necessary and good.<\/p>\n And yet\u2026<\/p>\n There\u2019s somewhat of a \u201craise the drawbridge\u201d mentality to these questions. Or to use a different metaphor, a \u201cboard up the house before the hurricane hits\u201d approach. It\u2019s the idea that if we can just avoid calamity for a short time, eventually things will get better and we can go back to living our lives.<\/p>\n This is not an effective strategy for success in these times.<\/p>\n In the classic Waite-Smith Tarot deck, the Four of Pentacles shows a wealthy man sitting by himself. He has one pentacle on his head, he\u2019s clutching another with both arms, and his feet are firmly planted on two more. Robin Wood takes it a step further and shows the man with castle walls around him. Traditionally, this image speaks of greed, hoarding, and isolating yourself from others.<\/p>\n But if a picture says a thousand words, a Tarot card says a million. What the man is doing is obvious. Why he\u2019s doing it is not. Perhaps, as many have suggested, he\u2019s Ebenezer Scrooge (pre-ghosts) who simply wants to hold onto everything he has and never share with anyone.<\/p>\n But perhaps these four pentacles are all he has. Perhaps someone is actively trying to take them away from him. Perhaps he\u2019s living on the edge of town because he\u2019s been forced out of his home in the city, because his job was eliminated by a billionaire and his team of hackers. Perhaps his very identity is under attack.<\/p>\n Perhaps he\u2019s not selfish and evil, he\u2019s just scared \u2013 for good and valid reasons. That\u2019s understandable.<\/p>\n Still, the Four of Pentacles is not a helpful strategy.<\/p>\n Protection magic is necessary and helpful. At the same time, \u201chunker down and wait it out\u201d is not an effective strategy.<\/p>\n First, there\u2019s no guarantee that waiting \u2013 even in relative safety \u2013 will get you where you want to go. The progress we experienced in the mid-2010s felt like it would go on forever. But it stopped in 2017 and we\u2019ve been headed in the wrong direction ever since. If we keep waiting for things to get better we may be waiting a very long time.<\/p>\n And second, you can burn a lot of years hugging your pentacles behind those walls. Perhaps I\u2019m just getting to an age where this is obvious, but even if you\u2019re relatively young, years spent behind castle walls are years that you don\u2019t move forward, don\u2019t build for the future, don\u2019t lay a foundation for something bigger and better down the road.<\/p>\n By all means, learn protection magic and use it often. It can help keep you out of serious trouble.<\/p>\n But protection magic alone isn\u2019t enough.<\/p>\n That said, if you can\u2019t then you can\u2019t and you shouldn\u2019t feel bad about it.<\/p>\n For all that I\u2019m not as vulnerable as many, 2024 was a difficult year for me. Early 2024 was so bad I wrote Survive And Advance<\/a> where I used a basketball metaphor to remind myself and everyone else that sometimes all you can do is all you can do. Sometimes anything beyond eating, sleeping, and doing what you have to do to make sure you have food to eat and a place to sleep has to be postponed. Or canceled.<\/p>\n I also pointed out that while surviving is Priority 1, advancing is Priority 1-A. \u201cI can see better days even though I can\u2019t see a path to get to them.\u201d I kept moving and things got better.<\/p>\n But the days when all I could do was survive weren\u2019t fun. I don\u2019t blame myself for just surviving, but the sooner I could get back on track the better.<\/p>\n Working magic is easy.<\/p>\n No, seriously \u2013 it\u2019s easy. There are hundreds if not thousands of books that will teach you how to do it. There are techniques ranging from elaborate spirit invocations to drawing sigils to simply lighting candles. And contrary to what some people say, you don\u2019t have to be \u201cborn a witch\u201d to do magic and witchcraft. Yes, some people have more natural talent for magic than others, but anyone can do it, and with a little practice almost anyone can do it well.<\/p>\n What\u2019s hard is figuring out what to work magic for.<\/p>\n One of the reasons \u201cprotection magic\u201d is difficult at times like these is the question of \u201cprotection against what?\u201d Magic works best when it\u2019s narrowly directed toward very specific targets<\/a>. And also, magic works best when you use it to bring what you want, not to avoid what you don\u2019t want. One of the core principles of operative magic is to state your goal in the positive and in the present tense.<\/p>\n So what do you want?<\/p>\n Carpe diem<\/em> can bring some amazing experiences, and it can keep you from spending so much time worrying about the future that you forget to enjoy life. But an overemphasis on carpe diem<\/em>, combined with an economic system that has us constantly chasing money for rent that\u2019s always going up, can cause us to spend huge chunks of our lives spinning our wheels and never building or doing any of those wonderful and magical things we dreamed about when we were kids.<\/p>\n We need to figure out what we want, and then figure out a strategy to get there.<\/p>\n Divination can\u2019t tell you what you should do, but it can help you figure out what you want to do.<\/p>\n We don\u2019t want to be the Seven of Cups with our head in the clouds, spending so much time on what could be that we never do anything. If you\u2019re feeling the need to actively resist, you may want to be the Seven of Swords<\/a> \u2013 especially as drawn by Robin Wood. The Six of Swords is a good model for moving on in troubled times.<\/p>\n I\u2019m particularly fond of the Eight of Cups. I like it so much I led a UU Sunday Service on it titled I Like It Here \u2013 Why Do I Have To Leave?<\/a> Even if you don\u2019t like your current situation, it\u2019s often easier to stick with what we know than to move on toward something uncertain, even if it might be better\u2026 and in doing so, burn a few more of our limited years living in ways that do not serve us or our highest values.<\/p>\n The key is to be moving toward what we want.<\/p>\n Yes, we want to be safe. Yes, we want to be protected from those who would do us harm, either directly or through negligence. That\u2019s what you want to be free from.<\/p>\n What do you want to be filled with instead?<\/p>\n Now, how are you going to get it?<\/p>\n![\"photo](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/243\/2025\/02\/Four-of-Pentacles-Eight-of-Cups-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/a>The Four of Pentacles<\/h2>\n
Hiding won\u2019t get you where you want to go<\/h2>\n
Sometimes you have to just survive<\/h2>\n
The key to effective magic \u2013 a good strategy<\/h2>\n
Seven of Swords? Eight of Cups?<\/h2>\n
What do you want?<\/h2>\n