Merry meet everyone, So I have decided to create this post because with everything going on in the world at the moment we are all stressed out. Either with christmas/Yule being held up with rules or the fact that the virus still hasn't stopped taking lives of people we love and care about. Then theres working around this time of year anyway to add to this bundle of worries and stress. So I have been using crystals within my work place to help me relieve stress and to help me focus on what really matters. So I will list the crystals bellow and why they are great little helpers when you are stressed out. I am a big believer of crystals as you may know from past posts and I believe theses should help you with your said stress. That being said all theses crystals that I will mention effect people differently so one crystal may not like you or may want to focus on another aspect of your problems instead. Its trail and error when you don't know which crystals work well for you or if they like you. Yes that sounds like there picky children but that can be the case. I always pick crystals that speaks to me because of this reason. Amethyst is one of the best crystals you can have in your collection. This crystal helps to relief stress and also can improve your clarity and focus. This is one I have as a bracelet that I can wear at work because of theses great helpful uses. Black Tourmaline is another great crystal to have in your collection because it is a great protective crystal. This little guy loves to ward off negativity and helps to keep your positive vibes flowing. Blue Lace Agate is again a great crystal to have in your collection. I have a couple of theses in my collection because they are such a great crystal to bring peace and promote loving energy within yourself and your home. I normally use theses around christmas when family are around. Blue Sodalite is another one of my favourites because it brings this comforting energy over you when its near and it also helps to stimulate self-confidence which when I brought mine is what I needed for my work. Carnelian is another one that I use and this is normally in my office at home because it brings this boosting energy that helps you become confidence and inspired. This is one crystal I love having in my office while I am working on topics for my blog because its always inspiring me for the great blog post. Moonstone is one that I have only had in my collect this past year and I swear its the best little helper I have had for what I needed it for. Moonstone is great for bringing balance to the female hormones and because of this is great for females to relieve stress and bring a heighten intuition to yourself. It also helps to balance your emotions which connects to the hormones. Rose quartz is the last crystal I will be talking to you about for this topic and thats because this crystal is such a great stone to bring love and harmony to yourself. This will help relieve your stress by bring you loving care and peacefulness. You can carry this handy little crystal around with you to bring the peace and tranquillity you need with you for work too. I do hope theses help you relieve some of that ever building stress and that you learnt something new to. If you want to keep up to date with all things witchy then why don't you join the community on Facebook or Instagram @PaganVibesOnly. I post as often as I can to bring you updates on topics I am working on and also new items I have gotten for my craft. I am always asking for help on new topics and post ideas too so if you want to help out then join me on theses platforms. As always I hope you enjoyed today's post and it helps you out. I will see you all in the next blog post. Please everyone stay safe in theses strange times. Blessed be x PaganVibesOnly x
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Merry meet everyone, So I have been going through my book of shadows the last couple of days and found this amazing autumn abundance spell that I do each year. Now this is using items from the amazing trees that cover our world and using what they give us through out autumn. So you will need to make a list of items you wish to go out and hunt for. What you will need is: At least 7 items from the list bellow to represent the autumn harvest and the trees you wish to connect with. - Ash seed pods, - Pinecones, Cedar-cones or Fir cones. - Maple seeds (What we call as helicopters) - Acorns - Oak leaves - Holly berries Now all theses should be ready for you to collect from mother earth. I wouldn't recommend taking them off the trees or bushes themselves but collecting what they are willing to give. There is ways to ask for items but thats something completely different to todays topic. You will also need: - A wand if you use one within your craft. - spell candle for atmosphere. Now you can choose which ever colour candle you wish to use with this spell. I normally use a colour connected with autumn or the basic white candle if I dont have any colours in my stash. Now light the candle and spread the items from your collection out on your altar, you can spend some time placing them in an arrangement that fits your altar perfectly. What I always love about this bit is how creative I can be with theses items. When you are happy with how things look, pick up your wand if you are using one, if not use your hand instead and touch each tree-gift as you say the following words: "Easy abundance flows through me as it flows through the tree" When you have touched all the items the trees have gifted you, you then draw a pentacle over the altar and close the spell with the following words: "I bask in the ease and energy of abundance, Blessed be" I then leave the altar the way it is for a couple of days to let the spell of abundance work through it all. You can then give the items back to mother earth once you feel it has completed the task or keep them on your altar until the next sabbat. I personally do this spell around the middle of Mabon and Yule because there is normally more to collect from the amazing trees than at the beginning when Mabon starts. I hope you use this spell within your celebrations of this season and that you find it helpful for yourselves. If you want to keep up to date with all things witchy then follow me on Facebook and on Instagram under the name @Paganvibesonly. If you want to chat with the community or even get involved with post topics then there the places to be! As always I do hope you enjoyed today's post and that I will see you all in the next one. Please stay safe as theses are strange times we live in. Blessed be x PaganVibesOnly x https://flow.page/paganvibesonly Merry meet everyone, I have been personally looking into historical witches that build up our history. We as witches should always honour those that have came before us and for that this series was born. Today I will be talking about a famous witch called Isobel Gowdie who was based in Auldearn, Scotland. Now this is close to home as I am from England which is another reason I have started this series with her. Now theres so many different stories about Isobel that you can never be too sure which is real and what is made up for the ghost stories. Many of the information in this post has been collected from quite a few different resources so I can tell you 90% of this information must be correct. Now many of you may have already heard about Isobel Gowdie because she has been mentioned in many modern witchcraft books. These books include: - The devil's mistress (1915) A novel by John Brodie-Innes. - The drowning pond (2005) A novel by Catherine Forde. - Isobel (1977) A novel by Jane Parkhurst. - Night Plague (1994) A novel by Graham Masterton. As you can see she has inspired many novelists and I am sure there will be more to follow to but what do we personally know about this famous witch? She is one of the few witches that has appeared in the Oxford dictionary of National Biography and was also featured prominently in the book 'The witch- cult in western Europe written by Margaret Murray. This book has been considered by many as a significant influence on the emerging new religious movement as we all know it as wicca back in the 1920s. Now we know witches have been around for many many moons going all the way back to the start of history and many paths were created to honour this. But what else do we know about dear old Isobel Gowdie? Now thats the problem with having so many novels based on this famous witch. Not much is actually known about her. We know she was married to one John Gilbert, whom had no ties to the magical path as Isobel was. Its claimed that she was brought up in Auldearn area in Scotland, this is because she mentions many nearby villages during her confession of witchcraft. Her age is still unknown to use but with us knowing she was married and the legal age for marriage back then in Scotland was 15 she must of been older than that when she was caught. I may note that during her confession she alluded to have engaged in sexual practices fifteen years earlier, which would place her somewhere between thirty and fifty years of age knowing that most marriages back then happened around the age of twenty six or seven. It will be forever unknown if she had any children as there is no records from that time and she made no reference to any children in her confessions. We know that Isobel and her husband lived in Loch Loy and it seems likely her husband worked as some sort of farm hand. Its also likely that Isobel helped her husband as she had no education but was known to have a good imagination and could express herself in such a meaningful way. The one aspect of this that stands Isobel apart from other witch trails was because of her sheer volume of her confession. Its still unknown by many what the outcome was by the confessions Isobel made and it took over two hundred years for her confessions to be published in 1833 in 'Ancient Criminal Trials in Scotland' by Robert Pitcairn. Its also known that her confessions were celebrated but the original documents that had all the information leading up and during the confession had gone missing. They only later showed up in a unmarked box two centuries later that were connected to the belongings of Isobel's landlord. Theses papers reveals that Isobel Gowdie made a series of four confessions over a six week period, most likely while she was kept underground held against her will. The first confession was made 13th of April, which meant she gave her last confession around the 14th of may depending on the weeks. Its known that she was held against her will in solitary confinement where she was most likely beaten and starved. They most likely also deprived her of sleep by chaining her up against the wall so she couldn't go to sleep. While she was imprisoned she was interrogated by the local ministers. They were known as Harry Forbes and Huge rose and they interrogated her while other watched. Her testimony was very much heavy imprinted by the questions asked as many witch trails back then were. They would ask 'when did you make a pact with the devil' and 'When did you fly to the witches sabbath' which in those times were common to be asked. I personally feel like karma will come upon the souls of those who treated any women in this way but then this hits close to home. Her confession was very much coerced as the statement will show bellow that even though she may have not been tortured by modern day standards she would of been tortured even by just keeping her in a dark room chained to a wall for 6 weeks. the statement starting "The said Isobel Gowdie appearing penitent for hir haynows sines of witchcraft and that she haid bein ower long in that service without any compulsitoris proceidit in hir confessione and concludes that it was spokin and willinglie confest' God English was bad then. That statement just shows they were covering it up. That she was tortured by illegal measures to get what they wanted out of her. It was common back then that anyone that was found out to be a witch was subjected to the horrors of sleep deprivation and even the use of the witch pricker which was known to be active in moray at that time. Knowing she was tortured to confess doesn't mean that what she was saying wasn't her own. She had such great detail in her confessions that they couldn't be just what they fed her to say. They were personal and very vivid to her that many question if she was tortured into saying her confession or was fed it. She stated that she attempted to destroy her neighbours crops by using puddock plow so that afterwards only thistles and briars would grow which was unique to her, as many others confessions stated using children's bodies within their workings. This is just one of many changes that her confession stood out from the others. That one thing that stands out for Isobel is that fact most of her magical workings were herbal remedies and blessings that helped heal people. Many like myself believe she was a magical practitioner and with her claims to have performed charms and spell workings to cure fevers and broken bones show she was classed as a wise women back then a bit like a doctor for us today. Overall it fills me with such pain reading about what this women went through and what she must of endured thought theses 6 weeks or longer of torture. No women or fellow witch should of gone through this. No matter the time in history should anyone be attacked for being who they are and yet history shows time and time again that it happens. Lets hope we all learn from the past and move forward respecting everyone but we know thats for many is just a fairy-tale. I hope you learned something from today's post and that I will see you all in the next one. As always you can keep up to date on all things magical on instagram and facebook under the name @paganvibesonly. I hope to see you all in the next post and please everyone stay safe in theses strange times. Blessed be x PaganVibesOnly x |
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