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Major Arcana Soul Mirror

I highly recommend this exorcise/spread by Mary K. Greer. I used my old battered copy of the Vertigo deck, because although I might have retired it from divination duties, it’s still one of my absolute favourites and definitely the one that means the most to me personally and resonates on the deepest level. It was my first deck after all, and soulmates never die.

Jump over to https://marygreer.wordpress.com/2008/08/12/major-arcana-soul-mirror/ and give it a go. A tip is to just read text until the picture of how to lay out the cards, and once you’ve chosen your cards in the right order, then proceed to read the rest of the text below the picture.

I think you’ll discover a thing or two about yourself 🙂

A Luciferian 4th Step

“Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

I’m an addict in 12 Step recovery, as I may have mentioned. It goes with my Luciferianism just fine.

Currently I am on Step 4 again (we do the steps over and over, not just once). The Fourth Step is sort of famous for being an ass-kicker. It’s difficult and terrifying, because it requires looking at ourselves deeply.

This type of soul-searching is potentially very Luciferian in character. It’s about knowledge-seeking and truth-seeking, shedding illusions, bringing light to what was obscured– all this in pursuit of spiritual growth. It’s a good step on the way to apotheosis, in other words.

Despite the very Luciferian nature of this work, I have been procrastinating from it lately through other witchy pursuits. I mean, why take a hard look at myself when I could be reading Enoch?

But Lucifer never lets me slack for long, and kicked my ass towards shadow-self work. From there, it didn’t take me long to get it through my thick skull that the 4th Step itself is a form of deep and thorough shadow work.

So, reluctantly, I sit down and down my damn stepwork. It doesn’t feel as magic or glamorous as that shit I do with cards and candles and dreams, but honestly I know from experience that the 12 Steps is the most transformative process I have ever undertaken. It IS magic in its own right.

I am grateful to have a badass witch for a sponsor, one who can help me incorporate my faith and my magic with my steps.

And grateful that for my dual Higher Power I have my Inner God, who gives me all the courage, strength and emotional resources I need to deal with whatever may come.. and Lucifer, who never tolerates laziness or self-deception for long.

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Can we then say that Lucifer is evil, or can we say that Lucifer is good? One can only say that if a man maintains that Lucifer is evil, and that we must flee from him, then it must also be said that we must avoid fire, because in certain circumstances it destroys life. On the path of initiation we find that the words good and evil cannot be used in this way for the description of any being of the super-sensible world order. Fire is good when it acts in good conditions, evil when it works in evil ones; in itself it is neither the one nor the other. So it is with Lucifer. He exercises a good influence on man’s soul when he becomes the instigator of man’s sacrifice on the altar of human evolution of all that is most individual in his soul. Lucifer becomes an evil being rather, what he does becomes evil — when he arouses impulses leading only to self-gratification in the human soul. Thus, once our attention has been drawn to these beings, we have to follow up the effect their deeds have in the world. The acts of super-sensible beings can be described as good or bad; the beings themselves, never!

Rudolf Steiner, INITIATION, ETERNITY AND THE PASSING MOMENT (Anthroposophic Press, 1980), lecture 6, GA 138.

In which Rudolf Steiner almost makes sense for once

Revoking a Baptism

stormywitch:

In my community, and I don’t doubt many others, baptizing a baby is common practice. People make entire celebrations out of this. But what happens when the child grows up to find that Christianity wasn’t the path they were meant to follow? I do believe a baptism is a devotion, which is why I do respect those who get baptized later in life, but being forced to break a devotion can leave the relationship with Yahweh sour, which some don’t particularly feel comfortable with.

I was personally never baptized, luckily, but I’ve taken the steps to undedicate myself to Wicca. (Not as intense as a devotion but still a chord had to be cut.)

One way to revoke a baptism is to go to a priest and have them formally do it. But if anyone else lives in a community like mine you’d know this can be impossible. Priests have full power to refuse to do so. And I believe to be a witch is to take power into your own hands. It’s what we do.

So if you’re a beginner pagan witch and you want to properly start again with your newly found faith, here are some tips.

Cutting the Cord

A releasing spell can be one solid way of disconnecting yourself from Yahweh. On a waning moon, gather a piece of white yarn or ribbon, a cleansing bath (purified water with sage, salt, mugwart and Angelica) some sharp scissors and a black candle. Tie a knot in the middle of the yarn signifying the promise made during your forced baptism. At this time, you can look up the Lord’s Prayer backwards and recite it, or speak your own words to god. A sort of break up text. Then cut the knot and dip the ends in the water, clearing the relationship of any hard feelings. Discard the yarn and pray to your chosen gods (or not).

Putting out the light

In the Bible, Yahweh has more than once been depicted as fire. One way to revoke your devotion to him would be to light a white candle and tell him everything, if you want to. At the end, extinguish the candle, signifying the end of the bond.

Black Baptism

This is something I thought of during my time researching traditional witchcraft. At night, go to a natural body of water encased by woods. In essence, you’ll perform a new baptism, voiding the old one and dedicating to your chosen gods or yourself or your craft. Either wear black robes or go skyclad, call out to your gods or recite the Lord’s Prayer backwards before submerging yourself completely.

Final thought

I do have to say though, this isn’t necessary. One understanding of souls, in my opinion, is that the gods you’re destined to find and follow, the ones that care for you, follow you through your entire life. They saw an unwilling promise being made and stepped in. You were baptized to “god” but it’s never specified which one. The gods you’re destined to be with were the ones in that title when it was spoken. You can interpret it as you’ve always been dedicated to your gods.

Excellent info. I wonder if I need to do something or other to cleanse myself of ties to Yahweh, Christ and Archangel Michael (thanks Anthroposophy), even though I am pretty sure Lucifer chose me young. I still like the idea of a really clean break, done respectfully and without hard feelings.

Just for Today

August 1

Freedom from guilt

“Our addiction enslaved us. We were prisoners of our own mind and were condemned by our own guilt.”

Basic Text, p. 7

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Guilt is one of the most commonly encountered stumbling blocks in recovery. One of the more notorious forms of guilt is the self-loathing that results when we try to forgive ourselves but don’t feel forgiven.

How can we forgive ourselves so we feel it? First, we remember that guilt and failure are not links in an unbreakable chain. Honestly sharing with a sponsor and with other addicts shows this to be true. Often the result of such sharing is a more sensible awareness of the part we ourselves have played in our affairs. Sometimes we realize that our expectations have been too high. We increase our willingness to participate in the solutions rather than dwelling on the problems.

Somewhere along the way, we discover who we really are. We usually find that we are neither the totally perfect nor the totally imperfect beings we have imagined ourselves to be. We need not live up to or down to our illusions; we need only live in reality.

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Just for today: I am grateful for my assets and accept my liabilities. Through willingness and humility, I am freed to progress in my recovery and achieve freedom from guilt.