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<\/a>I haven\u2019t been a covenleader for very long. Foxfire was born sometime in September of 2013, when I was still training with my parent coven. I was a second degree in my tradition, and was working with two close friends-turned-covenmates.<\/p>\nIt was pretty exploratory in the beginning. They had each only ever done the open circle thing (one of them was actually running an open group), and I hadn\u2019t quite built the confidence required of leadership. We had a great time, though. Being new together is an amazing experience\u2014really different from working with an experienced teacher or learning by yourself out of books. There\u2019s much less pressure to get things right, and that lack of self-consciousness naturally lends itself to the practice of magic. It was one of the most magically productive periods in my life.<\/p>\n
After a couple of years, I was elevated, I hived formally with a working partner, and I had my first initiates. Foxfire was officially a Gardnerian coven, and it wasn\u2019t long before we were on outer court, too.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m really proud of what we\u2019ve built together, but it\u2019s been really hard. There have been times where I\u2019ve felt like we were going to implode, or I was going to crack and just not want to do it anymore. I\u2019ve also screwed up pretty royally as a high priestess. I\u2019ve hurt some feelings, and I\u2019ve been hurt myself. I\u2019ve had to go backwards and change course and admit to my mistakes. Here\u2019s a little of what I\u2019ve learned over the years:<\/p>\n
Give people a chance.<\/strong><\/p>\nYou have to be discerning about who you let in to your group, sure. Foxfire has a very rigorous screening process, and we\u2019ve only had once case of accepting someone who wasn\u2019t already an acquaintance. That\u2019s pretty common in traditional witch covens: we spend time scoping people out in mundane life and expect that you\u2019ll be social with us before we invite you into ritual space. Just like dating, it can be really hard to know how someone will shake out in the long term.<\/p>\n
But, ultimately, you can\u2019t know. You think you can, but every high priestess I know has a story about bringing in someone that they regret. It might take ten years, but people change, shit happens, and there are about a billion factors that we just can\u2019t predict from moment to moment. I\u2019ve been disappointed, myself. In the last few years, I\u2019ve learned that bestowing membership on someone is a gift, and an act of trust. I have to give that person the opportunity to do something good with it\u2026or to not. That\u2019s on them. You\u2019re always taking a chance, even when you\u2019ve known someone for years. I\u2019ve been on the fence about people, but I\u2019ve also overwhelmingly been really grateful to have taken that chance. A lot of the time, it\u2019s worth it to give people the opportunity to surprise you.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t try to be anything but a priest\/ess to your covenmates.<\/strong><\/p>\nThis was really hard for me, because I\u2019m not the best at boundaries. It\u2019s especially hard after you\u2019ve come to love people. It\u2019s also hard as a newbie group leader, because you want everything to be perfect and to flow smoothly, and that means there\u2019s a temptation to micromanage people and take on too much responsibility for their<\/em> magical practice and their<\/em> personal lives. But for the sake of maintaining those healthy boundaries and, by extension, a healthy coven, focus on just beings the HP\/S.<\/p>\nDon\u2019t try to be a therapist (please, seriously). Don\u2019t become mom or dad. Don\u2019t pretend to be a life coach.<\/p>\n
As a HPS, I don\u2019t even feel like I\u2019m a teacher or a minister. I tell people, \u201cLook. I\u2019m a priestess in this<\/em> tradition, to these<\/em> gods. If that\u2019s what you want to be, then watch how I do it. Ask questions when you have them.\u201d That\u2019s very different than the active role I take on as a classroom teacher in my mundane life.<\/p>\nWhen people bring their personal problems, I try to be supportive and offer the advice of a friend. That\u2019s it. My Wiccan training didn\u2019t cover marriage counseling, diagnosing and treating mental illness, or filling out tax forms. Let people\u2019s life stuff be their<\/em> life stuff.<\/p>\nIf someone isn\u2019t being as diligent as you think they could be in coven stuff, or if their family life is screwed up, or if they\u2019re not treating their depression the way they should be, don\u2019t take that on as a personal project. Let them make their own choices, because that\u2019s what they\u2019re going to do anyway.<\/p>\n
But don\u2019t let that be all you are in the rest of your life.<\/strong><\/p>\nThis is the thing that bites most people and destroys groups, just in what I\u2019ve seen over the years. Like being a classroom teacher, being a group leader will suck up your whole life if you let it, especially as the group grows. Someone always needs something, and you\u2019ll always have things you feel like you should be doing. It\u2019s really easy to neglect other parts of your life.<\/p>\n
Neglecting other parts of your life will make you a shitty group leader in the long run. If your group meets every week and you\u2019re constantly working on individual projects with your people, but your home life is in ruin, your group will eventually start feeling it. If you\u2019re neglecting your finances, your health, your romantic relationships, your friendships, or your family obligations, your Pagan group will be just as rocked when those things explode.<\/p>\n
A coven can never be an escape hatch for the rest of your life. When people start using it as one, the whole group suffers. You can love your covenmates like family, but these relationships very rarely function<\/em> that way in reality. If you\u2019re a parent, a spouse, an employee, or whatever, those relationships don\u2019t become less important just because you\u2019ve taken on an additional role.<\/p>\nBreaks are normal.<\/strong><\/p>\nAny competitive athlete will tell you that breaks are important. You need time for your muscles to recover, otherwise you could be seriously injured. As a runner, my workouts are very different when I\u2019m training for a race versus when I\u2019m just trying to maintain. If I went all out all the time, I\u2019d blow out my knees and hips, because non-stop exercise literally destroys bodies. Just look at how young most Olympians and professional football players are when they retire.<\/p>\n
Improvement happens over time, and burnout is a real thing. I started dealing with it only a couple of years into being a covenleader, and I had to renegotiate some boundaries. I\u2019m still<\/em> trying to figure some things out. Probably always will be.<\/p>\nNot circling for a month or two doesn\u2019t mean your coven is dying or that you\u2019re a failure. Life happens and people need breaks. It\u2019s not uncommon for members to go on hiatus for a bit while they deal with family things, health stuff, or whatever. That\u2019s not a sign of weakness or a lack of dedication; it\u2019s part of living a balanced life.<\/p>\n
If you expect people to show up to every group meeting and you\u2019re meeting multiple times a month, get ready to be disappointed. If you hold yourself to that kind of standard, get ready to start feeling burnout (mine manifests in the form of irritability, depression, and fatigue).<\/p>\n
You don\u2019t have to use witchcraft for everything. You don\u2019t have to employ all-out rituals to connect to the gods. You don\u2019t have to live in lala land to really be practicing magic. No one can survive on fantasy alone. It\u2019s okay to just skip whatever thing the moon is doing that night and watch Netflix, if that\u2019s what you need sometimes.<\/p>\n
\nI always get a little nervous when I meet newcomers and beginners and they openly discuss their ambitions to be group leaders. Not that I want to discourage them, but I do think that often there\u2019s a failure to appreciate just how complex and taxing this kind of responsibility is. Being a high priestess is in many ways the most rewarding part of my Craft life, but it\u2019s also the most draining, the most stressful, and with the least immediate gratification. It\u2019s amazing, but it\u2019s not always fun. It\u2019s challenging, but it often takes all my spoons.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m constantly wrestling with this stuff. It\u2019s gotten easier, but I have rhythms to my leadership that took some sussing out. Certain times of year are easier than others. Certain strategies work better with particular people. And sometimes I\u2019m just going to screw up. But I\u2019m a lot happier not holding myself to the intense standards I had when I was only imagining<\/em> what being a covenleader would look like.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There have been times where I\u2019ve felt like my group was going to implode, or I was going to crack and just not want to run it anymore. I\u2019ve also screwed up pretty royally as a high priestess. I\u2019ve hurt some feelings, and I\u2019ve been hurt myself. I\u2019ve had to go backwards and change course and admit to my mistakes. Here\u2019s a little of what I\u2019ve learned over the years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2241,"featured_media":593,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,18,4],"tags":[140,78,112,6],"class_list":["post-590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pagan-community","category-practical-stuff","category-wicca","tag-burnout","tag-coven","tag-coven-leadership","tag-wicca-2"],"yoast_head":"\n
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