The Poet Priestess

I stood in the centre of the room and felt the tension rise. Glancing over my students I could see the people causing the shift, someone finding difficulty in the interruption of the class. The mundane had invaded the magic. The tension made me angry; the attitude of the interrupted students irked me. It pushed my buttons, and I vaguely knew why. I acknowledged the tension and my emotions, and breathed. Slowly and carefully I drew everyone’s attention to this moment of interruption and the shift in energy.

“Witchcraft is not a two hour class each week, it is a way of life. It is not just the moments you spend meditating, not just the practices and exercises, not just your studies, your coursework. It is not just reserved for festivals and celebrations. You do not practice spirituality, you practice the techniques of your spiritual path. You are your spirituality. You must learn that the mundane life and the magical life are one and the same.”

In that moment, many years ago, I saw the glimmer of understanding that I later termed Spiritual Separation. The idea that our spiritual existence is separate and distinct from our mundane, every day life pervades subconscious thought. Many spiritual paths, including Witchcraft, extols the idea that every day is sacred, that we are all interconnected, that we are all spiritual beings within a spiritual world, and yet the temptation to separate the magical from the mundane is often apparent. We go to Sabbat gatherings, to Hatches, Matches and Dispatches, to festivals, to workshops and classes. We practice in public, in private, with friends and sometimes strangers. We raise our hearts and our voices in celebration. Yet too often we separate our sense of spirituality away from the jobs that we do, the roles that we take on with others, our relationships with friends and family, and seemingly mundane actions like eating and exercising. Spirituality is not simply reserved for periods of celebration, meditation and ritual, it pervades all that we are, all that we do. If we are conscious of seeing the sacred, the Divine, the magic, within the physical world around us, then surely we are also capable of seeing that every action we take in our daily life is an energetic interaction with the universe.

I think it is difficult to live with this concept in our conscious mind at all times – I know that I don’t. I plod through my days, good days and bad days, I cook, I clean, I walk, I work, I play, I dance, I tuck my children into bed at night and kiss them before they fall asleep. I often do not do these things with a fully conscious awareness of the underlying energy, but in the moments when I pause, when I ponder, when I focus on those actions, I can certainly see the spiritual within the usual, the magic within the mundane. At times of anger and stress I act and react, but with reflection I can see how my every action – even the harmful ones – is impacted by my spirituality and in turn impacts my spiritual practice. There are times when I am fully aware of the influence of Witchcraft in my mundane life, when I stir a pentagram into my morning tea, when I sweep the floors, when I run a bath, when I dance with my children, when I sing whilst I work, when the earth beneath me and the wind around me centres me as I peg clothes upon the laundry line. Every moment holds a potential to connect with the world, with my Gods, with the deepest parts of myself. Every routine holds the potential of ritual; every meal holds the potential of celebration; every sexual act holds the potential of sacred connection. Even without my conscious awareness at all times, every day, in every way, I am energetically interacting with the world around me, with the people around me, with the spirits around me, with my Gods around me. Every day, in every way, I am a living expression of magic – whether I remain aware of that or not. My magical life and my mundane life are one and the same.

Witchcraft is a word that not only encompasses what I do and many of the beliefs I hold, it is also a word that describes who I am and how I interact with the world around me. To me a Witch is a Witch every day, in every way, not only during times of conscious crafting.

Bumper sticker moment: A Witch is for life, not just for Halloween.

This post is a part of the Pagan Blog Project 2014