Orientation: What Kind of Witch Are You Becoming?

Welcome to the Fall Semester, witches.

I really do love thinking of The School of Body Magic as an elite institution. I’m not referring to rigid academic guidelines, formality or stuffiness. I like the framework of academia because real study asks us to return to ideas more than once. To practice. To experiment. Magical practices are practices that improve when iterated. We need a dedicated space and community to notice and discuss what changes when a teaching moves out of the intellectual realm and into our actual lives.

Witchcraft is not a collection of cool ideas; it's about living in the demonstration of our beliefs.

That is part of what I want us doing together this Fall: Define for ourselves what we believe. 

The School of Body Magic is built to fulfill a clear mission for each student. I want you to develop a magical practice that is embodied, discerning, ethical, useful, and alive in your real life. I am not interested in training you to outsource your authority to me, Estrellita (the school’s AI oracle assistant), a card deck, a spirit, an astrologer, or the loudest witch on the internet. 

The School is here to help you learn how to notice clearly, interpret carefully, choose deliberately, and practice consistently.

EEEEEEEE *New school year energy shiver of excitement*

I encourage you to begin by developing a set of working principles that can help you explore all the ways your magical powers can be used. These guiding principles help you understand what kind of witchcraft you are actually practicing. When things become overwhelming or overly complicated, they orient you toward the next right step. 

Some of mine are:

The Body is the First Temple of Manifestation.

I maintain an explicit and active relationship with the dead.

My relationship with Nature is erotic and a major source of power.

Self-love is non-negotiable.

These principles shape the way I practice. They influence how I work with ritual and how I understand manifestation. They help me relate to grief and the Dead. They also shape how I experience the natural world and how I think about power.

These are navigation anchors, but they did not arrive fully formed. They emerged through years of study, lived experience, trial and error, somatic work, spiritual practice, death, pleasure, mistakes, and the continued process of paying attention.

But these are my working principles.

They are not commandments for you.

I offer you this framework to support your explorations, not to create a rule. The authority that matters most in this spiritual development space is YOURS. I want you to develop your own unique relationship with magic by practicing discernment.

You may hear one of my principles and feel an immediate YES in your body. You may hear another and think, “Hell no, puta!” You may understand one intellectually now and discover six months from now that your actual life has changed your mind. Good.

That is discernment.

That is also part of becoming a witch who can live in relationship with her own power instead of constantly looking outside herself for instructions/validation/solutions.

Witch Wisdom: Your practice can be influenced by many sources. Your authority governs what remains.

So this month, think about your own working philosophy of magic. Do not let the pressures of perfection or the false belief that your philosophy cannot change stymie your explorations. Your working philosophy is allowed to evolve as you do. 

Ask yourself:

What do you currently believe magic is for?

Does your practice ground you when there’s a storm brewing?

What kind of relationship do you want with your own power?

Are you clear about your own boundaries?

How would you benefit from being able to clearly define and articulate answers to the above questions?

Let’s find out! 

Click here for your Free PDF: Your Working Philosophy of Magic. Think of it as a one-page reminder to contemplate how living a magical life would truly benefit you. In those answers lie insights you can use to further define your own path. 

You can also reshape the exploration and try on different concepts:

What is one principle you would like to adopt this season?

Once you have something, ask yourself what it would look like to live it. We are defining the principles of your witchcraft. A philosophy must be embodied and demonstrated to become real.  

I encourage you to use the same exploratory mindset when using the Vault this semester.

The Vault is not there for you to consume from beginning to end. You are not behind. There is no prize for opening every file. Think of it as a practice library: a place you return to when you can feel your desire for power and change stirring, but you may not know where to start. Pick any piece in the Vault and dedicate your practice time to it 3x in a week. Let it ground a new investigation of your magical studies. 

You could also bring this kind of question to our resident AI Oracle Assistant, Estrellita. She is there to help you find your place amongst all the magic, ask questions that will help you gain invaluable insights, choose and create practices, and return you to your own authority. 

You can ask her:

“I’m developing my own working philosophy of magic. Ask me questions that help me uncover what I already believe about magic, power, the body, relationship, and spiritual practice. Do not tell me what my principles should be. Help me notice my own.”

This is a really fun way to gain intimate self-awareness of your particular power flows. 

Sounds delicious. 

So, are you willing to step toward the mirror of your authentic expression and answer this question: What kind of witch are you becoming?

With you in the dark,Mel, The Body Witch