No video post this week. Sorry.

 Dear Reader,

Aside from the fact that I am recovering from a migraine due to a major shift in the weather, the lawn company is here and a tree removal service is working across the street. I thought my place was loud when we had all the fans going earlier in the year. Good grief, these folks might as well be in my living room with all the noise. At least the yard is going to look nice, I guess.

Loud got redefined. I'm not sure how to describe it as exceedingly distracting and a bit obnoxious. Fortunately the tree companies come around only twice a year to trim stuff for the power company. For some reason, the lawn company was a few days late. It was raining for the last few days, so that's probably it. But I didn't plan on have all of that noise when I was trying to record a video. I attempted and on playback, I was barely audible. It was kinda impressive, to be honest. They were louder than my kids.

Herbs, tools, & treasures: My Bag of Tricks.

 Dear Reader,

I'm not sure how many people carry their history literally with them. I'm not sure how many people carry fetish objects (the religious use of the term) to allow them to reach out to their spiritual guides and allies. I have what I like to call my Bag of Tricks. It's a small bag that can easily be hidden if necessary. It holds in it the things I need to call my spiritual allies to me, to reach out to my familial dead, and to reach out to the life of the land. Now, I'm not going to identify which item is which because these things must be secret for them to work properly. But here's a picture of it.

Practical Witchcraft: Dirt Poor Witchcraft pt. 1- Don't buy expensive herbal products, look at the ground and your spice cupboard.

 Dear Reader, 

I apologize that this post is a day late. I'm still trying to reorient myself timewise after being sick for about a month. If you're like me you don't have an extravagant budget to get all the latest herbal products recommended by the big name folks in the pagan and witchcraft community. Don't panic or think you can't do that money drawing spell that you planned to help your budget a bit. You have options that you may not have realized were there.

Now before I give you a list of some of these options for you to consider, I want to recommend a couple of books that have been extremely helpful in my process of 'wildcrafting' magic. I honestly don't know why folks call it wildcrafting when it's the way it has been done since antiquity. Intimate knowledge of the land and what is there to use is how everything was done in the 'old days'. (Now, I won't say that the old days were better, after all people were dying of curable disease because they didn't have antibiotics, for example.) 

The first book I am going to recommend to you comes in two volumes. I can't recall if it is still in print, I think it is. It is M. Grieve's A Modern Herbal. This book is a bit dated as it was initially published in the 1930s, but Margaret Grieve took an academic approach to her topic matter that is timeless and easily understood. This book also has some print images in the style of James Audubon's artistic images of plants.

The next book I recommend is more current (having come out in the early '00s). The Nurse's Guide to Herbal Remedies is a book chock full of information that ranges from how to use a given herbal remedy to medications derived from it and things that contraindicate with it. I can't recall the author. The book got stolen from me about three months after I got it. To say the least I wasn't pleased. I may have the title wrong, but that is what my gut is telling me is correct.

The third book I recommend is The Encyclopedia of Medical Plants from Andrew Chevalier. This book has high quality illustrations of the plants that he discusses. It's basically a step down from The Nurse's Guide to Herbal Remedies. It does not get into what medications you should not mix it with or what medications are derived from it. But it does tell you what a given plant is used for, what parts are used, and how to prepare them for use.

Finally, I recommend is Cooking with Herbs and Spices by Andi Cleve, et al. This is a book I cross reference with the Encyclopedia of Medical Plants. It works very well to allow me to use my spice cupboard to treat minor ailments. While herbalism is awesome and can work very well, it is a supplement to modern medicine, not a substitute. 

With these four books in your library, you have the ability to step outside and look in your own yard or garden for the plants that will help you. In some cases, however, you need to check with your state's department of environmental conservation to make sure that what you're planting isn't an invasive plant in the region. If it is, put it into a pot and keep it under close watch. Don't allow seed pods to fall into your garden or fluffy seeds blow off to the four corners.

(Posted late because of my kitchen disaster) Divination: Rune Study - Gebo

 Dear Friends,

The rune Gebo (also known in some parts as Gifu) is a very important concept in ancient Northern Germanic cultures. It was, you could say, the backbone that served to help hold the culture together. Gifts were given often and served to cement social bonds. It is claimed that the All-Father advised "It is better to give too little than too much." Sounds like odd advice.

When living in a culture where gifts are given and debts can be incurred on the basis of what kind of gift is given, this is where the advice of the All-Father is actually really smart. In the ancient lands of old, visitors were given gifts of new clothes (and towels if they were wet from the weather). This was not because of the fact that the host was so delighted to see them but because it was a big part of basic hospitality. At the minimum, a poor host would give their guests food and drink.

These gifts put the guests into debt to their hosts, ensuring that they would behave properly while during their stay. A similar weight was on gifts given as part of marriage contracts between two families. (Mind you, during this era if a man assaulted a woman, she was free to cut off the offending part and nail it to the wall as a warning to others. Divorce was also a thing.)

Peace gifts were also a thing to in this era. They were given to cement the bonds between rulers. To refuse a peace gift was almost tantamount to declaring war.

When interpreting this rune, there are two things I keep in mind. This is one of the irreversible runes. That which is a blessing to one person may be a bane to another. (Think of the infamous white elephant story.) The most important thing for interpreting this rune is context. If it is in near proximity to runes known for benevolent influence, it is safe to assure that the gift coming is a good one. If it is in near proximity to runes known for malevolent influence, the gift coming should be handled with great caution and awareness that it might be a poison pill in disguise.

Update on the Charity Works.

 Dear Friends,

I have no words to express my gratitude for your support. The preemie hats are due to go to a rural hospital that the big program I was a part of missed. I may start making more preemie hats to send to the other rural hospitals in the area. I'm still deciding.

I am in the process of locating local organizations that would distribute scarves to the needy. It's not quite as easy as I thought it would be. I am not going to be defeated by people being hard to contact and such. If I have to, I'll show up on their door step with a box of scarves and say 'Hi, you help people in need. Winter's coming, these will be useful.'

Having just gotten over Covid, everything I've made thus far is going to go through a wash on high heat (thank goodness acrylic can stand it and just gets softer with it). I think I have about a medium load of stuff to wash. It feels like it should be more, but all of these hats are so small.

I am also working on a preemie layette. I've been writing down the pattern. I'm going to include a note with it requesting that they hold onto it until Nov. 7 (approximately) so that the preemie born on my birthday gets their first birthday present from someone who was a micro-preemie. I'll be including a card for the family of the child. This idea hit me as I was wrestling with some super thin yarn. And it struck me as so perfect a way to close this project for me. A bit of love and good will to someone who is fighting the good fight from another who fought that fight is always a good thing.

Please forgive my extended absence.

 Dear Friends,

Life got screwy around here and I was having trouble being grounded enough to do my daily chores let alone my writing in any format. When that problem more or less resolved itself, I caught Covid and was sick for a month. To say the least it has been a trying experience. I am not going to make any promises that I'll be back in form for writing every day. But I am going to try. Some of this will mean preloaded blog posts that were written several days before hand and some of this may include reposting of old content (as a last resort). If nothing else, I may post a few funny memes that I have had sent to me.

I am still dealing with a lot of exhaustion and some other symptoms, but I am much better than I was last week. This has me hopeful that I can get writing done, possibly across all formats. Covid was an awful experience, even with the milder Omicron variant (which we caught at my house from school). The anti-viral medications are serious business but they taste awful and you have to choke down 4 pills per dose. I guess that's better than a horse pill, but it wasn't easy. Fortunately, I and none of my family lost our sense of smell or taste.

My eldest is making noises that he feels like he's caught a cold. Given that was how he felt when he caught Covid, I'm a little nervous. My youngest is just fine and had mild flu symptoms for his experience. And Beloved was taking care of all of us as he had the sniffles. It was a strange experience to have the whole household sick with the same thing and displaying different variants of how it manifests. I also envy the living daylights out of my husband's immune systems. It always happens like this, I get sick and I'm flat on my back for at least a week and he gets the sniffles. As he says "Well, somebody's supposed to take care of you." He's a sweet heart but I still envy his immune system. LOL

I could go on an extended rant about how my region has decided to treat Covid like it's the flu but I won't because that's a bit too far afield from the purpose of this blog. To say the least, I am not happy with it and my kids want to go to a school board meeting to demand the reinstitution of the mask protocol from last year. This is a big thing given how they dislike public speaking. But, we're all muddling by as best we can. I've finally turned something of a corner in my recovery as my congestion is clearing up. Now I just need more energy and I can get stuff done. But such is life when you get sick, right?

What is the Rule of Our Lady? (pt. 1)

 Upon reading the teachings of Our Lady, I found many references to the first rule. Even in the adapted Madrian rules for a harmonious life, the first, universal rule comes up as the heart of all the other rules. This universal law is stated directly in The Clear Recital:CDV on page 105 in the second paragraph of The Way of Simplicity. Verse 5, line 4 we find the first rule of Our Lady stated explicitly: law of Universal Love. This is further clarified on page 109, Verse 38 of The Way of Simplicity:

Love every soul as you love your own self, and give forth freely of all good things of body and of soul.

We are called by Our Lady, all of us, from the least blade of grass to the highest of the janyati/angels to engage the world with love. This love stretches through out the whole of creation to the spheres of heaven and beyond. There is no exception to this rule.

What of the emotion hate, one might ask. Hate is not the opposite of love but rather an inversion of it, often due to a love betrayed. The opposite of love is indifference. They who are indifferent have no consideration good or ill towards the subject. 

Indifference can fly the flag of hatred and through doing so commit a great many evils. Indifference is opportunistic and can fly the flag of love if it serves its goals. There is no true love there but a skilled masquerade that is dropped as soon as the goals are met.

A perfect love is skilled in transmuting and healing the wounds of hate. A perfect love is unto all, even those who are abhorrent. It is not an easy path to walk in this complicated but it is the simplest and most courageous.

When it rains, it pours.

 The familial health crisis has now reached the recovery phase. I am kinda sitting on my loved one to make sure they don't over do it. I forgot how stubborn that man is. He is healing up well and has a follow up visit with our family doctor soon which we're expecting to hear good news. In the case of my dear niece she had her baby about a month ago (7lbs 3 oz) and it appears to have cleared up her health issues.

This weekend (Sunday into Monday) I had a migraine that kept me from writing as I had planned. Apparently there is a phase of a migraine that makes me temporarily stupid. Usually, I am sleeping through it but yesterday I didn't have that luxury. Too much stuff to get done. And I only managed two things on my to-do list. Granted they were important things (I had to order new eyeglasses and pickup prescriptions.) but I just didn't have the energy or the brain power to do things like wash dishes.

Then today, I'm groggy and thick witted as I recover from the migraine when the neighbors next door have a domestic altercation that set off my ptsd and left me a bit paranoid and distressed for the remainder of the day. So my plan to get two posts up today got nuked by my lizard brain saying I had to stay aware if someone was going to burst into my home and cause trouble. I tried doing some embroidery to calm myself down and give myself a sense of focus. That didn't work great.

It's been a rough week and it's only Tuesday.

I hate tech

Dear friends, my computer has been bricked by Microsoft and their inability to find my user profile. I have no idea why it happened. I am quite angry with the whole situation. I am hoping that Beloved will have some brilliant ideas about this. 

Due to a familial crisis, I will not be posting this week.

 Dear Reader,

There's an ongoing health crisis in my household that I am scrambling to prepare for potential fall out and the possibility that it takes my Beloved longer to recover from his testing than he thinks it will. If you're of the inclination to pray for others, please keep my Beloved in your thoughts.

Sorry, no video post this week.

 Dear Reader,

The last few days have been incredibly busy. On top of that, my home sounds like a WWII airport with all of these fans running. (Beloved says the air conditioner will be going in the window soon, possibly as soon as today. There's hope yet!) I've been having problems sleeping for the last several months and last night I got my first real night of sleep with a medication change. That medication change, however, has me running at half speed and not thinking quite clearly. As I adapt to this medication, that will clear up. But I am going to refrain from videos until I can put together a transcript that is actually legible. I tried a few times today to come up with something and I just had a lot of typos and bullet points that were loosely connected.

Give me a week or two to get my sleep schedule back in order and my brain back to full functionality. I'll still try to post, but they may be rambling nonsense like this one. Sleep deprivation is really weird, by the way. I only got to the mild stage of it, where there was the beginning of hallucination when laying awake in bed. I kept 'hearing' people in the empty apartment next door and my family talking when they were all asleep. Fortunately, I didn't panic. I just tried to go back to sleep after walking around the apartment to make sure everybody was ok. (I was hallucinating my husband calming both kids down after nightmares, when all three of them were literally snoring in their sleep at the same time. That totally doesn't count as talking in your sleep.)

Practical Witchery: Depression Witchcraft Master List of Links

 Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Divination: Rune Study - Fehu

 Dear Reader,

This week's Rune is Fehu. It is associated with cattle and moveable wealth (i.e. money). It is popularly considered one of Freyr's runes. The rune poems are of mixed perspectives on this rune's meaning. The Icelandic and Old Norwegian poems speak of wealth as being a source of strife within a group of people. The Anglo-Saxon poem speaks of wealth as being a comfort and something to be shared freely to retain one's good name.

Fehu is popularly considered Freyr's rune but there's not a whole lot of hard evidence pointing in this direction. This appears to be a wholly modern convention. Modern changes to rune meanings, however, happen as language evolves. Some changes are good, some are not so good (see the Nazi influence upon the rune Algiz or Sowilo).

In most readings, this rune discusses financial situations. In a direct/upright orientation, it speaks of positive financial implications. Depending on how it falls in a reading, it may indicate a financial windfall that will be beneficial to the querent. In an indirect/reversed orientation, it speaks of challenging financial implications. Again, interpreting this rune in context of the runes around it, it can speak of financial hardship, increased expenses, or lost money. Typically, if Fehu pops up inverted with the rune Isa, it speaks of being stuck in a low income situation for a protracted period of time.

Practical Witchery: Depression Witchcraft (Pt. 5)

 Dear Reader,

This is the final post on depression witchcraft. I could say a lot more on the topic but there comes a point where you just have to sit with the situation and figure out what is healthiest for you. Depression is not a case of 'low energy' after magical work. It may feel that way, but it lasts longer and has more negative sides than the lowered energy levels. It has more in common with mood drop after a kink scene, in my experience. You come away from the euphoria of the scene and then everything crashes. Your mood drops, you get exhausted, there's a measure of numbness to the world, and nothing seems quite right. You may experience physical symptoms similar to a mild touch of the flu with depression. This is not because you have the flu but because your brain is sending out signals that something is wrong to your entire body.

It can be a mild experience or it can be a gods awful one, depending on how severe it is. When you are in the midst of that experience, there are three things to remember. It is transient. It will improve. And you need to handle yourself gently while you are unwell. You can't expect yourself to perform at peak levels when you are ill with the flu. Depression is an illness that saps your energy and makes you feel rotten along with setting loose a rabid pack of brain weasels to gnaw on your brainmeats and tell you horrible things. Ask for help if things are too much. Be patient with yourself as you work towards recovery. And seek professional assistance if things don't start to improve within two weeks. ♥

Divination: Rune Study - Peorth

 Dear Reader,

There's some debate as to if this rune represents the dice gaming bag (mine pictured to the right with the rune card) or the birthing bench. In either case, this is a card of chance. Depending on how it falls in a reading, it can indicate high stakes (like what you find in birth) or random results (like what you find from a bag full of dice). Peorth is mentioned in only one rune poem, indicating that it is something pleasant. The debate about the birthing bench versus the dice bag is a modern one (within the last twenty years, as best I can tell).

In the direct orientation, I interpret it as a positive indicator that what ever risk the querent is undertaking has the potential for success and lucky outcomes. In the reversed (inverted) orientation, the rune can be a warning against undertaking the risky activity. Much of this is influenced by how the rune falls with others. For example if Peorth falls reversed with Boerc in direct orientation, the querent is looking at a situation where the gamble will have a positive result but it will require some sacrifice and enduring a challenging, random experience that comes with it.

~*~*~*~*~*~
Yes, I am a rpg nerd of the old school variety. We've got a 1 which indicates a critical failure in your roll and a 20 that indicates a critical success. Peorth is the random chance that leaves you somewhere in that range between success and failure. It will never be fully explained because it is random. But, if you look at chaos theory, randomness is a good thing and can lead to highly interesting results.

Update time.

 Dear Reader,

It's been a while since I have posted. I have been under going a protracted period of mental health difficulties. The largest problem has been sleep. Failure to get a good night of sleep is challenging for neurotypical people. Sleep deprivation is awful. (It's even considered a form of torture under the Geneva Convention.) But, my malfunctioning brain is not letting me sleep all the way through the night. I've been working with my doctor to get this sorted out.

If you've been keeping score, this has been a problem since last August. About then is when there was a steep decline in posting. This is not because I plan on discontinuing the blog or anything else like that. It is simply because I have been so tired that functioning on a daily basis has been a struggle. Anything beyond the bare minimum to get through the day is an ordeal because I am so tired that I can't think straight.

Throw on top of this the challenges of being a parent to two teenagers with educational needs and stuff like other family obligations, blogging fell to the bottom of the list of things to do at terminal velocity. My difficulties thinking clearly has lead to challenges coming up with content for you. I can't remember what I have done already and I can't find my notes on what I wanted to do (because in my last hypomanic cleaning binge I threw that notebook away because it was full and I couldn't think of any reason why I needed to hang on to it. Hypomania sucks, y'all.)

I deeply appreciate your patience and your readership. I hope to start posting again soon. I have a new notebook and I'm beginning to get organized again. Mental health is treated like a luxury disease that if you're rich you can afford treatment. Us regular stiffs are stuck slogging it out and if we're lucky we find at least one good doctor to help us. (I got tremendously lucky after years of bad luck on that front and my psychiatrist is awesome.)

I'm attempting to get the paperback books that are published ready for republication in hardback format. There's some minor editing that needs to happen, but it's hard to work on it when you can't concentrate because all you want to do when you sit still is take a nap. I've gone through lots of coffee. The end result of that is I'm tired but I can vibrate through space and time. Still working with the doctor to figure out the silver bullet for this problem. As of right now, I'm working my way through a medication change. It's a bit weird and not fully addressing the problem. I have a feeling it is going to be a few weeks before we have this fully sorted out if not a month.

I'm still working behind the scenes when I have the energy for it. Next week, gods willing, I will have up on Friday a critical analysis of one of the first works in the Opera Omnia of the Madrian Orders. (It's come to my attention that hosting for the Society for Filianic Studies has lapsed but if you use The Wayback Machine site, you can get their last capture for the website that will cover almost everything on the site. And I believe the books are still available on Lulu.com. I will check and note if they are with a foot note to this post.) Also, next Monday, I am going back to the Runes dealing with the rune of chance, Pertho. I'm still working on generating content for the other days of the week. 

~*~*~*~*~*~
The books and other materials that were published by the Society for Filianic Studies are still available on Lulu.com and you have to use the search word 'filianic' to find it.

Video post is delayed until next week.

 Dear Reader,

I had planned on doing a video post today. Then my brain flipped a switch and I'm trending from depressed towards hypomanic. Depressed, I am still relatively coherent. Hypomanic, I have a habit of interrupting myself, saying whatever comes to mind despite how ever harmful it could accidentally be, and doing stuff like reorganizing the entire kitchen by color. I'm not into full hypomania, yet. We'll see how the weekend goes. But, as it stands right now, I believe the wisest course of action is to not do that video post and step away from the computer until my neurochemicals even out again. Hopefully, I'll be back to posting Monday and this will be a short episode that doesn't get too weird.

Practical Witchery: Depression Witchcraft (pt. 4)

 Dear Reader,

This is one of the many faces of depression. Not everyone is going to look as if they're depressed and it's not a performative thing. There are a lot of stereotypes about depression. I could devote an entire post debunking them, but I want to focus on the ones that are problematic for the practitioners of magic and the witchcraft community at large.

(Brief warning, there's going to be some strong language here in parts of this.)

• If you are depressed, it is because you have too much negative energy.
• If you are depressed, you can spread your negative energy to others.
• If you are depressed, you can't do magic.
• If you are depressed, it is a sign that the Divine is not happy with you.
• If you are depressed, it is a sign that your Ancestors are not pleased with you.
• If you are depressed, it is a sign of weakness.

The list goes on and is progressively more repulsive. This is all abelist bullshit and you should ignore the person who is spouting it at you. Especially the one about it being a sign of weakness. Depression happens because of a neurochemical imbalance. Some people are fortunate enough to experience a temporary bout of depression that is relatively mild and can be resolved with sunshine, exercise, and such. More severe depression requires medical intervention. Lots of rumors go around that medical intervention is bad for your magical life. I am living proof that it a crock of shit too.

Sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is ask for help. This is a form of 'high' magic. This leads to self-transformation and growth. Suffering and trying to pull yourself up by your boot-straps is a Puritanical bullshit concept that does a ton of damage. You can not will your brain chemistry into working properly. You can not do it through affirmations and crystal therapy alone. When your arm is broken, you do not rub calcite upon it in the hopes that the calcium in it will impart itself into your bones and heal them. You go to a doctor and get the broken bone set so it will heal properly.

The practical, 'old fashioned' or 'mundane' solutions of going to therapy, seeing a psychiatrist, and talking to your general practitioner are no less magical than healing meditations while holding that calcite to evoke healing of your broken arm. 

I want to put special emphasis on two things in my parting note here. If you are depressed, the Divine and your Ancestors are not punishing you. If you are suffering from any form of mental or physical illness, this is not an indication that you have some how offended them. Sometimes in life, things don't work right. It's a natural consequence of having an incarnated soul. When things don't work right, like when you get depressed, seek out assistance. It is by working together that we see our greatest strength.

Veiled Witch Video Update Time.

 

Please forgive the wild hair. (Hubby calls it my mad scientist look and finds it adorable.) I talk about the mass shooting incident that happened at the next city west of us, rant a bit about Covid-19, and give a general update on how things are going on over here. TL:DR/didn't watch - White supremacists should be classified as terrorist organizations; Covid-19 is still a damn problem, so wash your hands; my brain went 'splody for a bit.

Divination: Rune Study: Sowilo

 Dear Reader,

The rune of the Sun is a problematic rune because of the Nazis. They reinterpreted this rune to mean 'victory' and used it in the emblem of the infamous SS troops. The concept of Sowilo as the rune of victory has lingered in various divination practices. I do not believe that the rune of the Sun is a rune of victory.* (Though in my book on divination, I did note this interpretation because it is shockingly common despite the source.)

The Sun in Germanic and Nordic cultures is a source of comfort, joy, and a sign of Divine will. The existing rune poems from antiquity all agree upon this. Interestingly, the Anglo-Saxon Sigel and Younger Futhork Sol variant of this rune can not be reversed. It is considered to be the direct opposition of the rune Isa. This makes sense when one considers the climates these runes come from and the roles played by that which these runes represent. Sowlio could be argued to be the spark that melted the ice and freed Ymir, Burri, and Aldhumba. 

Sowilo is a rune of primordial light and warmth. It is a rune of hope and liberation.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* I do not believe that a single rune indicates victory but rather a configuration of various runes, depending upon the lay out and the situation being examined. Even Nyd can potentially indicate a victory of sorts.

Errands, doctor's appointments, and gardening, oh my!

 Dear Reader,

Today has been a busy day and I'm not even half way through my list of things to do. I am working on getting the apartment cleaned up. I did a little gardening. (I think the Oregano is going to win the turf war with the Vinca Vine in the left hand bed, but who knows. It's still early in the game.) I have to take my son to a doctor's appointment because he got bitten by a tick when he was out hiking yesterday. It's just been super busy.

I will have the rune study post up as soon as possible. Fortunately, the weather has sorted itself out and I'm pretty sure that it will not be a week of migraines like last week. That two day migraine was awful and then one came along two days later because of that shift in the weather. Beloved calls me the human barometer because of this. He's not wrong. LOL

Divination: Rune Study - Tiwaz

 Dear Reader,

This is one of the runes directly associated with a deity. Tyr or Tiw is one of the oldest recognized deities within the Norse pantheon. He is known as the Sky-Father, the god of War, and the god of Justice. He is most famous for having his right hand bitten off by the wolf Fenris when he was bound by the Aesir through trickery.

Unfortunately, this rune has a strong modern association with Neo-Nazis and neo-facism. There is an effort to 'take back' this rune from these groups, but like all grass roots efforts, it is taking time and much of the work is happening behind the scenes. Tyr is a god of warfare and is strongly associated with the protection of warriors. It is for this reason that the rune was taken as part of the regimental logo of the 32nd SS Volunteer Grenadier Division. The Nazi appropriation of the Runic system has left something of a bitter taste in the mouths of all who encounter runes, leading to suspicion when they appear as part of a tattoo or some other form of bodily ornamentation.

One must remember, however, that Tyr is a god of justice and likely cursed the Nazis for their use of his rune in that fashion (and said curse likely continues upon others who do the same). Tyr is also a god of sacrifice for the greater good, which one does not find extolled in the communities that use the runes as short hand for white supremacist ideology. In my experience, Tyr is a humble deity who is very approachable, much like Forseti (another deity of justice). From what I have seen, in dealing with justice situations, Tyr handles the adversarial situations (such as criminal justice cases) where Forseti handles the situations where negotiation and mediation are necessary (such as civil cases).

When this rune appears in a reading, it can indicate a number of things. Upright, it can indicate victory over a current conflict, success in legal matters, and a just outcome in a difficult situation. Reversed, it speaks of sacrifice to maintain status quo, ill turn of luck in legal matters, and a possible miscarriage of justice. This is one of the runes that if pulled for a yes/no question gives a very definite answer. Upright the answer is yes, reversed the answer is a hard no.

What's been going on in my neck of the woods.

 Dear Reader,

I haven't been doing exactly too great over here. The tarot reading business that I was running I had to shut down because the site that I was working with has become too predatory in their approach towards advisors. It's bad enough when the cost of overhead for having a listing is 53% of your income. That was why I shut it down before. Then I came back, raised my prices and said if I had a brick-and-mortar site I was working at, that I'd have a good chunk of income go towards that and swallowed down that uptick (when I started with them, it was 30% of your income). 

The company that I was working with to have that listing changed hands again and they made changes to how they assessed metrics and the policies were punitive to part-time advisors. They were also screwing over people who had been long term (as in working with this place from when it was founded in the late 90s, long term) advisors with changes they were making to internal policies. Thrown on top of this, the company was no longer providing technical support advice via forums that had been set up for it, put the onus for trouble shooting problems with their app on the advisors, and made it practically impossible for you to get ahold of someone to actually address problems on the site for advisors, I had to walk away for good. Especially when they started erasing posts in the advisors only forum where advisors were discussing the challenges faced by policy action and posting a 'notice' (read warning) that only 'uplifting' posts were permitted. Sorry, Friend Computer, but happiness is not mandatory so you can go right to Hel.

I've been in a bit of an emotional tailspin for the last month or so because of this. It's made for a huge change to my daily schedule that I am struggling to cope with. It's further increased my social isolation due to the fact that I live in the boonies and I have a hard time socializing because of my social phobia. It's been a rough couple of weeks, y'all. It also looks like a writing gig that I had set up is falling apart despite the fact that I did a lot of work. It's emotionally really hard to realize that about three years worth of work and emotional investment is ultimately not going to go anywhere.

And then there's the writer's block that I realized was panic that all of my work blogging and writing was futile and a powerful wave of despair. So, in an effort to combat that despair, I am going to resume working on blog posts. I've got more time now. I am also going to get to work on the list of books that were supposed to be done but I was working on that other gig and forgot about those. The books are going to take a while because I have to get my notes in order and transfer stuff from old format to new format and rewrite a bunch of things. That's all before the dreaded editing process.

Next week, I will be back to posting stuff about Runes. We've got six left out of the Elder Futhork to cover and then that series will be finished. I will do a wrap up post that puts all of the links for each rune on it. After that, I haven't decided what direction I am going to go next on the divination front. I have to review what I have up here to see what I have missed. (Side note: sometime late summer <if everything goes according to plan> I will have the condensed version of the handbook for psychics out.)

Practical Witchery: Depression Witchcraft (pt. 3)

 Dear Reader,

It's been rough for a while now over in my neck of the woods. I'm starting to come out of that depressive episode and, boy, is there a mess around here to clean up. Depression can make you neglect things that are important, like self-care. For witches, self-care looks a little different for every witch you meet. One thing that they'll agree on is that regular practice of grounding and centering yourself is important to be on the path to recovery from depression. Now, if you ask 13 witches how to do this, you're going to get 463 answers.

Here's my contribution to that 463 answers.

• Eat or drink something - the act of consuming food and beverages forces one to focus on their body.*
• Sit on the floor or the ground. Then project your energy down through your spine and pelvis into the surface you are sitting on. Allow it to be absorbed and dissipate.
• Take a shower or a bath - this is like the first suggestion and works to get you back to a 'mundane' headspace.*
• Hold a rock or put your hands into dirt. Then project your energy through your arms, out your hands and into the stone or dirt. If you're using a stone, after projecting your energy into the stone, set it on the ground and wait for the energy to dissipate.
• Wash your hands or place your hands in running water
• Hold an ice-cube, for a more intense sensation to focus on place the ice cube in your mouth
• Note five elements of your environment that you see. Repeat the process with your other senses
• Practice the Square Breathing technique: Inhale to a slow count of four, hold your breath to a slow count of four, exhale to a slow count of four. Repeat as necessary.

You may notice that some of my suggestions are classic techniques used to help people with PTSD and other dissociative disorders to refocus on their present situation. These techniques work for people with depression and are struggling to focus. They are also highly effective for helping you let go unwanted energy.

*For people who are bodily dysphoric, these exercises are difficult and I recommend choosing one of the other exercises. Remember, this is supposed to be a gentle exercise to ground unwanted energy and focus you on the present moment.

Addendum: Bodily dysphoria happens for many reasons and to many people. If you are struggling with it, you are not alone. Be gentle with yourself and your body, it is your home on this plane and as special as you are. (And yes you are special and deserve to be happy, healthy, and well.)

Divination: Rune Study - Hagalaz

 Dear Reader,

I first want to apologize for how long it's been since I said I was going to start posting again. The last few weeks have been nothing but chaos. It kind of seems fitting because the next rune is Hagalaz, which is associated with chaos by many diviners. The rune card just sat there lurking beside my laptop as things like my camera quit working for no reason, my allergies suddenly became so bad I thought I had Covid (I didn't, thank goodness!), and my kids went on break from school earlier than was printed in the school calendar. (The school calendar has some misprints in it, like the surprise superintendent's conference day last month.) It's been an interesting time.

Hagalaz translates to the word 'hail'. This is not the greeting but the ice that falls out of the sky and flattens your field of wheat (or busts your car's windshield). Wikipedia has the different variants of how this rune is formed on their page. The rune poems all agree that this rune is discussing hail. In agrarian communities, hail is a big pain in the neck. It can ruin a field of crops, damage equipment, and (if you're caught out in it) injure you or your livestock. This rune is one of the more negative ones in the entire system. It is tied with Nyd and Isa for the amount of misery it predicts.

Hagalaz is also one of the runes that can not be reversed. As one person said: the opposite of chaos is more chaos, not order. Depending on the placement of this rune in a reading, it can mean an immediate challenge that must be endured or a protracted period of difficulty. When you are pulling runes on a yes/no question and this one pops up, the answer to your question is a hard no (this is also true for the runes Nyd and Isa). Either way, this rune portents challenges and hardship where ever it falls. It is my experience that Hagalaz's challenges can not be averted or mitigated as those predicted by Nyd or Isa, only endured.

Divination: Rune Study - Jera

 Dear Reader,

This week's rune is about a week late, if we're going to be honest. Jera (Wikipedia entry at this >Link<) is associated with seasons, specifically the harvest season and the time frame of a year. It is positively aspected and can not be inverted. Jera speaks of prosperity, wealth, and a good year.

The rune itself is one of the few Elder Futhork runes that are not connected into a single glyph. It goes through some transformation in the Anglo-Saxon Futhork and in the Younger Futhork where it becomes a glyph that is entirely connected. Details about these transformations can be found at the Wikipedia entry referenced above.

This is among the runes associated with the god Freyr. It is pretty much always a positive rune no matter where it falls in a reading. The runes around it may dim some of that positivity (like paring Jera with Nyd may speak of a less than ideal harvest), but it still has that positive element.

It's going to be a rocky re-start.

 Dear Friends,

It's been a long while since I've posted in here. I've been struggling with health problems due to my C-PTSD and trying to regain my equilibrium since August. Back in January, I thought that February was going to be just two weeks of intensive therapy work and I'd be fine. It ground on and on, I became more despondent because I worried that I wasn't going to get back to any of my writing again because of how much of my time and life the therapy work was eating up.

Throw in on top of that two medication changes to attempt to resolve the severe insomnia problem that arose because of the same C-PTSD issues and I was not doing well. I am at a better place now, however, and I am hoping to get back into the swing of posting interesting and useful content again. As I mentioned on Tumblr, during my period of convalescence, I read the entire Opera Omina of the Madrian Orders. I have some big thoughts on those two books. 

I will be doing a critical (read academic) analysis of the works in there at some point in the future. I am currently re-reading and taking notes as I do so. I just have to give a big shout out here to the Editor of the Eastminster Library. The care taken to preserve these texts as they were presented whilst changing their format is highly evident here and deeply appreciated.

I am planning on re-starting video posts on Thursdays. The first of those will be sometime this week or next. I am also planning on resuming the Rune study (the next rune we'll be looking at will be posted a little later today). It is my hope to resume working in the same format that I had going before with each day having a different topic. I can not promise success, but I will try. 

Going radio silent for a few weeks.

 Dear Reader,

You may not be aware but I have been struggling with some ongoing mental health problems since last August that has severely impacted my life in a number of ways. I am taking the next few weeks to do some intensive therapy work to try to get that problem under control again so that I'm functional and I can get back to writing again. In the meantime, I will not be posting here because I expect I won't have the time due to the  plans for how to approach this therapy process. I hope to be back to post again and interact with everyone via my social media platforms soon. I just don't know how soon that is going to be.

Wish me luck.

Practical Witchery: Depression Witchcraft pt. 2

 Dear Reader,

As I mentioned in my last post, depression is hard and it makes a lot of things challenging. The first step in handling your magical and spiritual life while depressed is to lower your standards for yourself. You would not expect a person with a broken leg or a badly sprained ankle to run a marathon. You should not expect yourself to perform as you would with out the illness of depression weighing on you.

I am currently in a depressive episode and I have had to drop my expectations for myself down a good bit. You'll find that I am posting less right now. This is not because I am giving up on the blog as much as I am posting what I have energy to do on a given day. Depression can make your energy levels fluctuate and cause problems with your ability to focus. As a result of these two things, I write less and try to do more concrete things that are fairly low effort (i.e. wash the dishes, crochet a washcloth, do some mindless task).

My magical practice takes a pretty big hit when I am depressed. I don't do nearly as many rituals and when I am engaged in a ritual, it's challenging because of that focus problem. This is where I pare down how many steps in a spell and just strive to get through the day. As of right now, I'm at lighting a candle and saying a prayer for something to happen. Super simple, really low impact on the effort scale, but effective magic.

Like I posted last week, you have to pace yourself. You have to take time to assess what you are able to do and what you are not able to do. Somedays will be better than others because of that fluctuation aspect of depression. Some times of day will be better than others. Don't pour all your effort into one big thing when you have several little things to do as well. That one big thing might use up your energy and leave you too exhausted to do the little things that you need to. Remember, the goal is progress not perfection. And anything worth doing is worth doing poorly, because at least you tried.

Divination: Rune Study - Wynn

This week you could say that we are looking at the polar opposite of last week's rune: Wynn. Wynn is found in the Anglo-Saxon alphabet. It is also known as Wunjo, when found in the Elder Futhork. This rune means joy or bliss. It translates to the letter 'W' in the modern English alphabet. 

In the direct orientation, it speaks of joy and happiness. In the reversed orientation, it speaks of delayed delights. Occasionally, a reversed Wynn speaks of miss opportunities for joy. It really depends on how it falls in conjunction with other runes and the method you use in laying them out.

The Anglo-Saxon rune poem is the only one for this rune. For reasons that I can not decipher, this rune dropped out of the other runic alphabets. In the Gothic alphabet there is a letter that has a similar name but a different appearance. One would suspect this was an evolution of the rune over time but this is merely the speculation of a lay-woman, not a scholar of linguistics. Wikipedia has an interesting article on this rune. 

Practical Witchery: Depression witchcraft (aka low impact exercises)

 Dear Reader,

If you follow my Instagram account, you see that I have a lot of pics of the different styles I'm trying to make work with my new hair style. This relates to the topic today, I promise. When you're dealing with depression, you have to know your triggers. One of my triggers is being cold. Since I shaved most of my head and gotten a faux hawk back last September, my head gets cold pretty fast. I have been pretty cold today because of the arctic weather we've been having. I finally figured out a way to make this blue and gold pashmina work for a nice warm wrap that kept my head warm. It didn't boost my mood but it made it easier to bear things for most of the day.

Depression is hard to cope with on a 'good' day. It's equally challenging when the ideal conditions are in place for a potential good day. When you feel like giving up on everything and/or just sleeping for forever, you can't recognize the cues for that 'good' day. A low energy, low mood day wrecks havoc on your plans, especially if you wanted to do something magically related.

It is important to remember that the High Ones meet us where we are at. If we're too depressed to sit down and do a big, formal ritual, they understand that. Sometimes, all we can do is light a candle and pray for the depression to pass and ask for them to help us endure our ordeal. On the days that lighting a candle is too much, simply asking for help is enough. You can also tell them what's going on with you. That may not sound like magic but it is. It's a very simple form of magic where you give them your troubles. It doesn't instantly make them vanish, but you are no longer carrying that burden on your own. It makes it more likely for you to recognize the synchronous events that will help you endure the depression until it lifts.

Among the low impact magical exercises that I do when I am depressed are:

1. A self blessing and cleansing as I bathe
   
   
2. Dedicating acts of self-care to the High Ones
   
   
3. Lighting a candle and asking the High Ones to keep me in their care
   
   
4. Making a point to meditate (or at least try to meditate) for a few minutes on the good things in my life (this attunes your spirit to these things and makes it easier for you to notice them)
   
   
5. Reciting prayers for health and wellness

Divination: Rune Study - Nyd

 Dear Reader,

This week we are looking at a rune that is particularly influential during this season and during our times right now. This rune is known as Nyd, Naudiz, Nuad, or Nuaðr. It's name translates to need or distress. The rune poems on Wikipedia all agree upon this translation and present in some variation that need/distress is baneful in some fashion. It is associated with the letter N.

Nyd is one of the easiest runes to interpret. It simply means that there is a need or some form of distress in the picture. In an upright orientation (as seen in the picture above), it indicates a less dire situation than would be implied by a reversed orientation of this rune. If you are asking a yes/no question of the runes and you pull this rune, the answer is a very firm 'no' and a warning not to continue upon that path which has lead you to ask the question.

Nyd is frequently used in modern magic as a short hand for binding someone because one of its meaning is constraint. I, personally, am reluctant to use it in this fashion because this is a rune of deep power and grief.