As part of one of my witchcraft apprenticeships, I was experimenting with a pendulum and automatic writing techniques this weekend, and some interesting things came up. I’ve used both of these methods in the past, but one thing I love about these apprenticeships is that they really encourage a beginner’s mind, so I ditched what I…
If you’ve read virtually any spiritual writing, you’re well familiar with the mantra “let go of the outcome.” And yet there are (many) times when even detaching from the outcome of what you’re cooking for dinner can feel like a Sisyphean task. Why is this so hard? I believe letting go can feel so excruciating for the…
There’s an idea in Hermetic traditions known as the Principle of Mentalism, which states that everything in the universe was created by the divine mind, or what the Hermetic texts call “THE ALL.” (In this age of emails and texts, I can’t read the all caps without doing it in a shout-y voice.) In this school of thought, we…
Growing up, one of the messages I absorbed was “changing your mind is flaky.” Changing one’s mind was on par with breaking a vow (melodramatic much?), and I learned to associate waffling with weakness. If someone reversed a decision, they were labeled as incompetent and unreliable. It took me decades to unlearn this false belief, and in…
All my life, I’ve been taught that compromise is essential to healthy relationships. For decades, I’ve been chanting the mantra of compromise as I navigate decisions with friends, lovers, family, the dude at the auto repair shop, you name it. The problem is, it doesn’t seem to be living up to its glowing reputation of increased…
I was experimenting with weird breathing the other night. It was part of an assignment for an apprenticeship I’m doing, and it’s an exercise my teacher calls the “little death” breath, in which you breathe in for a count of seven, hold the breath in for seven counts, breathe out for a count of seven,…
I was putting laundry away yesterday when I saw a pair of shorts hiding in the bottom of my dresser. I’ve had these shorts for five years, and in that time I’ve worn them twice. The first time I wore them they were so unbelievably, crotch-cuttingly uncomfortable that I banished them to the Dresser Wastelands. Why…
I remember as a teenager sneaking into my parents’ book collection and reading all of their how-to books on raising an adolescent, just so I wouldn’t be caught unawares by any of their ploys. 😉 This sneaky habit became a love of self-help books as I grew older, and so I was very aware of the…