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I have not always been a positive minded person. When I was young it often seemed like things just did not go my way. I was a pessimistic child, and when I use that term, I can almost see the dark rain cloud following me around in my memories. There was a pivotal moment when that changed, and I remember it vividly. I was in junior high, on the basketball team, and I really, really wanted a new pair of shoes. One of my teammates had said the newest Air Max sneaker felt like walking on clouds, and I was sure I’d be a million times better at basketball as soon as I got them.
I had worked out a deal with my mom to pay for half, and the day had finally come that I’d saved up enough money. On my mom’s lunch break, we went to the local shoe store, and searched for my size. I had a game that night, and I wanted to break them in for a couple hours while my mom went back to work. They did not have my size. I bemoaned my luck, and sulked back to my mom’s office, pouting in that intensely devastating way that teenagers do so well. My mom walked over to the dark corner I was hiding in, and said to me, “You know, Giana, there are two ways you can be in this world: an optimist or a pessimist. Both take the same amount of energy, but a pessimist will never get their way, and an optimist will find a way.” I looked at her, and asked what it meant to be an optimist or a pessimist. She told me to go get the dictionary. After looking up the definitions, I again looked at her, asking, “But what does this mean to me?!” “It means you go get the phone book, and call the other shoe stores in the area to find which one has your size, and tell them to put it on hold for you. We’ll go pick them up after work.” Just like that. I called a couple of stores, and the next town over had a pair. I asked them to put it on hold. In that instant my storyline went from ‘nothing ever goes my way’ to ‘where there’s a will, there’s a way’. I knew that I needed to teach myself to be an optimist, and I made every effort to shift my thinking. Now, in my spiritual practices this frame of mind is not only a good practice, but also a necessity. I am a magickal practitioner, but for ease of definition let’s just say, thoughts become things. Magick happens on an energetic level, and like everyone who’s ever watched or read the Secret knows, if you believe something, then it is. The magickal lifestyle puts a person in touch with a world of energy, and that energy interacts with every aspect of reality. If I am a pessimist, then the world around me will respond in kind. Let’s backtrack. Every person who wishes to develop spiritually, to create a communion with the cosmos, must realize that along the path towards integrating with the great mystery will be many tests. These tests almost always are about a person’s ability to persevere, and have faith in themselves. When you’ve been working towards breaking subconscious barriers to your own happiness, the universe responds with tests to see if you can break your own barriers. Let’s say something devastating happens, like you lose your house. You are doing all kinds of work towards allowing yourself abundance, and your house gets swiped out from under you. A barrier mindset, or a pessimistic mindset, is to bemoan your grievances, wave your fist at the sky, and decide that the universe is conspiring against you. An optimistic mindset, a magickal mindset, is to see that your home was possibly part of the barrier to your greater abundance. Though it is never easy to lose a house, a spiritual optimist would look at this occurrence as a sign that bigger, and better things, are on their way. Mindset is a large percentage of the battle, but one also must be making steps in the mundane world to set action into motion. Is it time to move out of state, or country? Where is your soul calling you to? Heed that call, and go forth in faith. Let me give you a personal example. There have been many times in my life where I’ve been called to take a leap of faith. I remember quite vividly sitting on the back steps of my old apartment, talking to a friend about my job. I was unhappy with the pay, the commute was long, and gas prices had just made that commute very expensive. I felt it was time for a change, but I was barely affording the rent to my studio. How could I risk leaving that job? My friend looked at me and said, “I think you’re supposed to take a leap of faith.” I responded in agreement, “That term, leap of faith, has been popping into my mind a lot lately. I definitely think that is what I’m being called to do.” Even as I said it, the words struck a slight terror into my spine. By definition a leap of faith is not a sure thing, and requires a great amount of courage. I felt my stomach turn. Courage is not the absence of fear, but action in the face of fear, and I knew what I had to do. Keeping a positive mindset, knowing the cosmos had my best interest in hand, I jumped. That week I quit my job. A few days later I was offered a better job, with better pay, that was closer to home. My leap of faith had paid off. I wouldn’t say that leaps of faith always turn around that quickly, but I can’t remember a time when they haven’t. I want to take a moment to really flesh out this concept: bad things happen, which is not in our control. The only control we have is in our response to them, in our mindset. When a bad thing happens, it sucks! No one wants a bad thing to happen to them. Responding to the bad thing is the only real option we have in the matter, and my argument is that a positive mindset is necessary to move forth. Like my mom said, there are two ways, the optimistic and the pessimistic response, and both take equal amounts of energy to engage in. An optimistic mindset will find a way to rework the scenario, making it positive. The pessimistic mindset will sit in the mud of the situation. It is easy to shift the story-line of a situation. I once told a friend while visiting a magickal lake that I had a symbolic meanings ready to interpret if the lake was covered in mist, or if it wasn’t. I was ready for every situation, because I just needed to shift the story-line. I intended my visit to the lake to be magickal, and it would be, one way or another. The same is true for life experiences. Here’s a current example: in the last week I’ve been verbally attacked by both family, and people online. My actions haven’t changed dramatically, I’m still just being me, but being me is infuriating people. I could say, “Why is everyone attacking me?!” while dipping into victim mode, which is an option I would have chosen in the past. Or, I can shift the storyline, which I prefer. If I am being attacked, and not because I am acting like an asshole, then there is something in my energy field that is mirroring people’s dissatisfaction with themselves. That means that I am just a tool for their own lessons, and for me it means that I am being called to step into a warrior role. In the past, when people have attacked, I have backed down and internalized their anger as something that I have to own. It is important to know when people have a right to be mad at you, and when they don’t. Now, when people attack, I have been energetically meeting that experience, and not backing down. I will circle back around to this concept in a little bit, because it ties into my shamanic training. I have been coming to terms with the reality that if a person gains a certain amount of power in life, there will be those who hate that person. I remember talking to a friend who hated Gandhi, and I was appalled! Who could hate a pacifist revolutionary that succeeded!? Well, my friend did, and had specific reasons why Gandhi's actions weren’t desirable. So, even Gandhi has haters! I’m going to have haters, just for being me. Now, interpreting haters can be: “I’m so sad that people hate me!” or it can be, “I guess I’m starting to make a difference in this world.” Changing the storyline that surrounds your experiences is easy, in that you can just do it, you can just shift the meanings assigned to the experiences you’ve had. It gets easier as you do it more. I remember someone telling me once that there’s three sides to every story: your side, their side, and the story’s side. The truth tends to be malleable to the person telling it, ultimately affected by bias and perception. Here’s another example, I worked at a popular diner for many years, and at one point I made friends with a regular who would sit at the counter. We originally started talking because he came in reading the Bible, and I made some smart ass comment about a new version of the Bible that was gender inclusive. I thought it would propel him away from me, but it piqued his interest. From there on out he finished reading the Bible, and decided it didn’t make logical sense, so he moved on to the Tao Te Ching, and then some Wicca books. We would discuss philosophical foundations of reality, and I looked forward to the times we had to talk. One day I was telling him that I get obsessed easily, and that I don’t like that about myself. He looked at me, peering over his glasses, and said, “Well, what does it mean to be obsessed?” I responded, “It means I can’t get over things, I just go round and round. I feel out of balance.” “That’s one interpretation of obsessed,” he responded, “but you could also reframe it as being extremely focused.” That blew my mind! From that moment on I started editing my internal dialogue from obsessed to extremely focused, which sounds like a strength, not a weakness. I can be extremely focused, and by calling it that, it becomes something that is under my control, not something that has control of me. I would give myself focal points for my extreme focus, like projects, or books. Now I wasn’t spiralling down in self loathing for my inability to stop obsessing, instead I had reframed the concept and used this characteristic as a tool. One way to practice changing your mind is to create symbolic meanings for things. For example, I went out to my garden and there was a grasshopper sitting on my Rue plant. I looked up the symbolic meaning of grasshopper, and found several. I chose to attach energy to the meaning that I liked which was, something about moving forward, and listening to my inner voice. I took that as an oracle, or significant symbol and applied it to my circumstances. I took inventory of my reality: what am I holding back? I meditated on that and gave myself permission to move forward. There is symbolism in everything, and you can apply those meanings creatively to your life. When you create a story in this way you are training your mind to be able to transform your reality. So, a positive mindset it important in life, and in spirituality, especially in leaps of faith. I have found that leaps of faith generally produce great experiences, but even in saying that, know that a leap of faith is never easy. It is a calling from the universe to test your faith. You must have a positive mindset, be an optimist, with the universe. Faith, in my definition, requires you to be an optimist, to believe in something extraordinary, without proof, and breathe into that mystery every day. It is the release of control, and the mindset to allow that release to engulf you into the divine truths of life. Having a positive mindset will propel you into the cosmos, within and outside of yourself. I have to mention, if you are called to take a leap of faith, and you resist long enough, the universe will take away the opportunity for you to jump on your own. You will be propelled off that ledge, one way or another. I prefer to jump on my own as it feels more like an adventure, and less like a catastrophe. Let me say that again: if you are called to take a leap of faith, and you don’t do it, it will happen anyway. Now, there is an addendum to this positive mindset reality, when problems occur and block the path that you are heading down, you need to be able to discern whether it is a roadblock because you aren’t supposed to go this way, or if it is a challenge to overcome because going this way takes commitment. I find that the way to be able to read a situation, assuming you’re not already psychic, and able to interpret messages from the universe, is that you need to get real quiet in your mind, and sit with the question. Even sitting with the question requires a positive mindset, because if you sit with it believing that life is working against you, then you are not able to hear what direction you are supposed to take. When a person has a pessimistic outlook on life, things do not work for them, and further, they do not look for other solutions to their issues. When everything around me starts to fall apart I internally hit the brakes, and take inventory of myself. What was I counting on? What was the ultimate goal that I was working towards? When there are roadblocks, I ask myself, “What were the signs that led me to this place? Have I been barrelling through without checking in with the signs surrounding the process? Do I know that this road is not the best road, but the road I wanted to take?” If in my quiet moments with self I can feel that little part inside of me say, “This is the way. You need to persevere” then I will move forward. If, when taking internal inventory, I hear, “You really wanted to go this way, but this is not your road” then I stop, and take another route. It’s that simple, because I completely trust the process, and my communion with the universe. Remember, you will be called to learn faith; especially faith in yourself. Training yourself to be an optimist is both about your thoughts, and your words. You must watch how you think, and talk about, yourself. As I stated in my book Magick Where You’re At, “...every moment you must choose to be an optimist, with whatever your situation. Magick works on belief, and optimism is a state of mind. Many times people are not aware of the words they are using, of the dis-empowering stance they take in their language, or the reality that words are spells. Words are the verbal expression of thoughts. People are also not aware that they let their thoughts rule their minds, and if their words are disempowered, chances are their thoughts are as well. Your words are powerful, and you should watch what you say, and how you say it. Be aware of the web you are spinning, because, like a spider, it is sure that you will be living right in the middle of it.” (Cicchelli, 2016). The idea that I am really trying to convey is that our world is created by our words and thoughts. I am in no way, however, suggesting that people who experience trauma in life are responsible for it. This is a popular belief thrown around in various spiritual circles. I don’t subscribe to this motto because it is unhelpful, and usually makes the person suffering from trauma feel like it’s their fault. This is counter productive. Trauma happens. A person who experiences trauma shouldn’t be blamed for their reality. At the same time, it is of benefit not to let trauma become the defining story that gets repeated time, and time again. Even if it happens over and over again, it is best to stop telling the story. In fact, let this be the moment that you take inventory of the stories that you tell about yourself. Now, if that story that you tell over and over again is being utilized to encourage social change, then it becomes a position of positivity. By making the trauma story a platform for change, it is a source of power, and a catalyst for shifts in consciousness. The story that you need to stop telling is the one you use to prove to your friends and family that life just never works for you. By believing that something always happens to you, you will reinforce it, and it will continue to happen. Once you stop telling the story, and train yourself out of dis-empowering thoughts and words, you will find that your life changes, and that thing that always happens, won’t. This isn’t necessarily easy to do at first, and I don’t want you to beat yourself up if you don’t master it immediately. It is a gradual process that you engage with. I still find myself learning new ways to reinterpret reality, and shift my consciousness. It’s a journey, try to enjoy it. Shit happens in our lives. Some shit is worse than other shit. Even after my mom’s lesson in optimism, there were still times where I felt like life was working against me. Becoming positive is a process, rather than an immediate overhaul. It wasn’t until I was trained in shamanism that I realized my wounds could become sources of power. Every traumatic experience I had had became a lesson, and a gift. In my shamanic training, and healing experiences, I came to discover that in order to step into power one has to embrace their trauma, reclaim it, and reframe it into a gift. Now, I realize this can sound overly optimistic or cheesy, but really after a traumatic event what other option do we have? If being obsessive can be reframed into being extremely focused, then living in a household with emotional turmoil can be training for a person as a healer, or a counselor. I have heard a saying that the shaman is the wounded healer. For the shaman to learn how to heal others they have to be intimately aware of the process, thus wounded. Similarly your life experiences have trained you for your life’s purpose, and if you look at all of those experiences as sources of power, then you can reframe them, and claim them as your own. As promised, I’m circling around to another part of my shamanic training, which is reading the energy of a situation. Reading energy may seem woo-woo, or super psychic, or some other reason why you think that you cannot do it, but trust me, energy is always visible. In my shamanic training I had been taught a technique for dealing with conflict, or attacking energy, which is to read it, meet it, and then flow. The flow part is probably the most difficult aspect, but for our purposes I’m going to focus on the read it/meet it parts. To read the energy of an attack requires you to be self aware. Are you being an asshole that is in need of a good smack down? If the answer is no, then you need to read the energy of why you are being attacked. I mean, this is a crucial part of the positive mindset reality, you can’t be engaging in a positive mindset, all the while being a total dick to the people around you. I feel like I’ve met people like this, who will be completely unaware of how their behavior is affecting others, but then talk down to those others with, “You just need to change your mindset, and be positive.” The positive mindset tool is not to be used as a weapon to diminish other people’s reality, or to actively mistreat people, but you need to be self aware to know whether or not you are engaging in that reality. You need to check yourself. When you check in with yourself, and see that there isn’t a valid reason for someone to be mad at you, but they’re still mad, then you are a symbolic representation for something in their life that they can’t come to terms with. Having this awareness allows you to disengage with the reality that they are weaving, and stand in your own power. You can stand up to them with a mirror in energy, or you can reflect a vibration of disinterest. Either way you are returning the energy to them, and forcing them to deal with it. It is something that they wanted you to hold, but it is not yours to own. Energy is palpable. You already know the energy of most of the situations you enter into, but you may like to second guess yourself or believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt. Do not doubt your knowledge. You know the energy of situations, you can feel it when you enter its sphere, and you may logically reinterpret it, or you may believe people’s explanations when they tell you, “No, I’m not mad, it’s just..” this or that, or the other thing, when really they’re mad, but they won’t fess up to it. Trust what you know, because reading the energy is accessible to all humans. When you meet up with a friend, can you tell that they are sad? Yes, because you are reading the energy. Have you ever been walking down the street, and suddenly you are overwhelmed with the feeling to flee? Your senses were reading the energy of danger. You can always feel, or read, the energy, we’ve just been taught in western society to not pay attention to those feelings. I’m telling you to pay attention. Reading energy will make it easier to stay away from situations that will replicate past traumas; the energy is vibrating at the same frequency. A positive mindset, it’s easy, and yet difficult, but ultimately a choice we can make. A silly story of being positive minded comes from today. I had plans, awesome plans, family plans that I really wanted to participate in, but I woke up sick. At first I was going to push through. I can function while sick. I took a minute to breathe, and reframed the scenario in my head. I wanted to be part of the plans, but the plans didn’t need me to be there. I could just as easily stay home. I would miss out on the fun, but I would get some much needed down time, allowing me to work on some projects that I had been falling behind in. It’s a simple story, and not a devastating one, but the framing is the epitome of what I want to get at: there was a plan, it fell through, I found a way to reframe it so that no matter the plans, I still felt good about the day. Looking back over this chapter, I feel like I just keep saying, “Change your mind, and shift your reality,” but it’s a little bit more than that. To have a positive mindset in this world is to find a way to reframe your experiences so that they benefit you, and further become a source of power. A friend of mine says that I always put things in terms of power because I have so much scorpio in my chart. Let me explain my understanding of power: to stand in a fully embodied energetic field, seeing the shifts and tides, but being strong in your own foundation. I don’t use power in the sense of something that you take over on someone. I know that this is the popular usage, and often people get sucked up in a lust for power that they take in any way that they can. In my visualization of power, when you are fully embodied in it, then others who would take it from you, cannot. When a person makes you feel small, or insecure, they are taking your power. When you stand in power, you cannot be cut down. To have a positive mindset is to be situated in a position of power, because no matter what comes your way, you never feel like you don’t have choice. You can reframe the story surrounding the experiences you’ve had. You can claim what is yours to claim, and you can disengage from what is not yours, ultimately becoming the spider of your own life. In a shamanic ceremony that I attended, I had a vision of a spider weaving a web, and then sitting in the middle. I saw humans as spiders, each weaving their realities with words, and thoughts. Each web was its own cosmovision, and all the webs were interrelated, but also separate worlds. We weave the webbing of our stories, and we sit in the middle of it. What story do you want your life to be: positive, and empowered, or not.
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Training yourself into magick, and rewriting your story, is both about your thoughts, and your words. You must watch how you think, and talk about, yourself. As I stated in my book Magick Where You’re At, “...every moment you must choose to be an optimist, with whatever your situation. Magick works on belief, and optimism is a state of mind. Many times people are not aware of the words they are using, of the dis-empowering stance they take in their language, or the reality that words are spells. Words are the verbal expression of thoughts. People are also not aware that they let their thoughts rule their minds, and if their words are disempowered, chances are their thoughts are as well. Your words are powerful, and you should watch what you say, and how you say it. Be aware of the web you are spinning, because, like a spider, it is sure that you will be living right in the middle of it.” (Cicchelli, 2016).
The idea that I am really trying to convey is that our world is created by our words and thoughts. I am in no way, however, suggesting that people who experience trauma in life are responsible for it. This is a popular belief thrown around in various spiritual circles. I don’t subscribe to this motto because it is unhelpful, and usually makes the person suffering from trauma feel like it’s their fault. This is counter productive. Trauma happens. A person who experiences trauma shouldn’t be blamed for their reality. At the same time, it is of benefit not to let trauma become the defining story that gets repeated time, and time again. Even if it happens over and over again, it is best to stop telling the story. In fact, let this be the moment that you take inventory of the stories that you tell about yourself. Now, if that story that you tell over and over again is being utilized to encourage social change, then it becomes a position of positivity. By making the trauma story a platform for change, it is a source of power, and a catalyst for shifts in consciousness. The story that you need to stop telling is the one you use to prove to your friends and family that life just never works for you. By believing that something always happens to you, you will reinforce it, and it will continue to happen. Once you stop telling the story, and train yourself out of disempowering thoughts and words, you will find that your life changes, and that thing that always happens, won’t. This isn’t necessarily easy to do at first, and I don’t want you to beat yourself up if you don’t master it immediately. It is a gradual process that you engage with. I still find myself learning new ways to reinterpret reality, and shift my consciousness. It’s a journey, try to enjoy it.  My new book is out, and available on Amazon!!I'm super excited to share it with you! It is a collection of everything I think is necessary to live the magickal lifestyle.
 Hey hey hey!
I finally finished this book! I'm working on finding a publisher now, and hope to have it available soon! I am so excited to share this book with you, and show you a piece of my world. With this project finally coming to a close, I will be opening up my schedule to start working with clients, and teaching classes on magick again! Yay! Cheers! Giana Balancing academia with magick important, actually necessary, for a shaman-witch. Academia, though it is revolutionary in its own way, is a venue of policing thoughts, and institutions. This is needed in our society as the institutions dictate our thoughts, and those institutions are imbued with discrimination and oppression. We must unlearn our societal biases in order to free ourselves from the expectations of cultural norms. Academia is important in bringing equanimity and equality to the masses. Policing, however, tends to bring a mind into a pessimistic frame. Now, again, policing is necessary. I do not dispute the good that academia is doing. Policing, however, trains the mind to look for the hidden nuances of interaction that reveal the greater inequality. The mind needs to be trained for magick to work. Mind training is imperative, and it is very important to recognize the possibilities (not the probabilities) when working with magick. Do you see my dilemma? Magick requires that I train my mind to see the light. Academia has trained me to see the dark. Balancing must occur if I want my academic inquiry to be beneficial to society, and if I want my magick to work. One way in which I see this balancing act manifesting is that I try to take a macrocosmic look at society. The shit-show that we have created is part of the story, but the greater narrative includes rEvolution. Taking a shamanic journey, or a witch's flight, to see the greater picture helps me to see how a situation can be both good and bad. I can see the bad, and focus on the bad, and speak on the bad, but if I do not also acknowledge the good then my magick suffers. The magick that I want to create requires that I live optimistically. I know that it is considered a privilege to live optimistically, however, that is a academic fallacy. Optimism is a choice. I learned that lesson when I was 10. Optimism does not mean that I ignore injustice, rather that I acknowledge injustice as well as my ability to affect change. Remember: your words create the webbing of your life, and like a spider you sit in the middle of the web you created. Choose accordingly.   I am a witch, and a shamanic practitioner. As a witch I cast magick, work with the spirits of the universe, utilize snake skin, raven feathers, candles, tarot cards, and any other magickal implements that I deem appropriate for my extended metaphor, or are useful for their inherent energetic vibration. As a shamanic practitioner I do the same thing. I have combined the Peruvian (Q'ero, pre-Inkan) cosmology with the eclectic Wiccan cosmology that I was trained in. (Keep in mind not all Wiccans are witches. There are Wiccans that do not cast magick, but do observe the holy-days). Honestly, I have also mixed these cosmologies with my experiences, and how I was raised. In some ways I've retrained myself (I'm not afraid of hell or the devil anymore), but otherwise I have kept the wise words from every tradition I have encountered.
In my reality, in my cosmovision, feathers have meaning. Inherent meaning. They resonate with the power of the birds, they connect the practitioner with the mysteries of the archetype as well as the beings. I found the feathers when they led me through a park, to a shaded grove that felt like magick. I took those feathers home, as crow and raven are both animals that work with me. I decided to make a crown of feathers, well, actually the feathers guided me to make a crown of feathers. Others may look at this and call it a headdress. I don't care the name that is applied, however, the latter will bring an implication of cultural appropriation. Now, cultural appropriation is a very interesting topic, and worth investing some time looking into. I would like to state this in the conversation surrounding cultural appropriation though: feathers have inherent meaning and connection to magick. I cannot steal feathers from another culture's practice because feathers exist outside of culture. They exist because birds exist, and in an animistic cosmovision birds and feathers have inherent energy, knowledge, and power. Magickal practitioners of every corner of the world engage with this. Feathers have meaning. A magickal practitioner making a crown of feathers is not cultural appropriation (unless it is -- those cases are when people are merely imitating magickal practice, but are not actually aware of the power they are engaging -- my view of this phenomenon is that the imitator is engaging in a magick that they don't understand, but the magick will go ahead and teach them first hand ;)). I want to talk about this again, because the more I think of it the more I realize that movies that depict women as witches, and therefore evil, is also a type of Christian propaganda. Now, I've already touched on this in my last post and The Mary Sue movie review nailed it as an offensive movie to women and people of color, but I want to talk a little bit more about Christian propaganda. See, Christianity is the default cosmovision in America with a staggering 83% belief. This means that as the default norm of American society, people tend not to believe in reincarnation, they believe magick is bad, they believe that one day all the 'good followers' will be summoned up to heaven, they believe that there is only one God (who, in their collective reality, is white), and miracles are different from magick. This is a worldview that dominates American culture, which means that your average American believes the above statements are right and true. I've also heard that some Christians believe yoga is evil! Yoga is a series of stretches! But, to interpret that sociologically we can infer that Americans tend to believe anything that comes from another cultures spiritual practice is evil.
The more I think of it the more I realize most things are propaganda. The news: propaganda. T.V. shows: propaganda. Propaganda is just another way the the beliefs of the collective consciousness is influenced through media. I guess I'm just tired of Christian propaganda in a largely Christian nation. Though, as I say it I understand it: Christian propaganda is used as a means of reifying Christian cosmovision. The year is 2015, and we still believe miracles are not the same as magick. We believe that women who wield power are witches (I don't often hear about fear of sorcerers). These beliefs hold up the Christian paradigm that witchcraft (or the old religions/the old ways) is evil, and women are evil. If cultural belief holds these two sentiments true, then women's truth will always be questioned (when men speak they tend to be believed, whereas when women speak their truth is questioned), and the majority of people will not seek out their own power. I guess I coming back to what I said in my last blog, which is, this propaganda scheme seems to be more concerned with keeping people unempowered. Cheers! I originally wrote this for the blog at the Green Man store in North Hollywood. Posted here for your viewing pleasure.
I have always approached the moon tarot card with a bit of apprehension. Although my spiritual traditions revere the moon as a Goddess, and divine celestial energy, the apprehension I have felt has been towards what I have read about the moon card. If you were to google the moon tarot card the general words associated with it are: illusion, fantasy, something is being hidden, deceit, etc. These descriptors aren’t the type to make a person feel warm and fuzzy about their position, or about this supposed Goddess energy. I knew there was more to it, but I’ve generally just kept it at arms length with the overarching acceptance that the card means that not all the truths are on the table, someone is lying. Now, currently the moon has come back up to be investigated further, specifically as I was in Italy recently and I pulled the Moon tarot card for a fun puppet project while I was there. I looked at it, and at the meanings that were then presented to me by the facilitator: feminine power, the divine mother, and magic. I held in the back of my mind the same apprehension that I have always felt, but I played along with the puppet project, and decided to take the meanings that the facilitator had presented. Maybe the Moon would reveal herself further to me in my experiences in Italy, and those experiences would redefine the meaning for me, or maybe I just needed to be aware that some truths were being withheld. As is true for most experiences in my life, all of the above was true, as well as the Moon showing me its magic. In the week that followed I was taken on a journey of falling in love, participating in healing ceremonies, and visiting various black Madonnas, all while my spirit was in contact with the soil of my ancestors. So much magic! I felt blessed, and not too worried about the Moon tarot card. I figured I could ignore that I got that card, and just revel in the universe’s gifts. Well, hindsight would dictate that the universe’s gifts include the Moon card, and a new understanding therein. When I returned home from Italy I began to learn the true magic of the Moon card. The romantic situation I had involved myself revealed some very important truths that had been kept hidden from me, thus the Moon card stood true to its meaning. I looked back at my time in Italy, and how I had pulled the Moon card, and let myself just sit in the revelation that I knew as soon as I had pulled the card that truths were being kept hidden. If I let that be the end of my understanding of the Moon card, however, I would be doing myself, my experiences, and you dear reader, a great injustice. I continued to look up meanings of the Moon card to see what else presented itself. I referenced my first tarot book (that came with an accompanying deck), the Secret Tarot by Jane Lyle, and looked over her interpretation. One very important statement stood out: If involving a romantic relationship, be wary though you might feel the mutual infatuation, and the deep soul connection of true love, chances are you are under a spell, and it is not real. Eureka! This made complete sense to me, and to what had happened in Italy. Whoa! That is not the end of the Moon card story though, because I knew that even though the truths had been kept hidden from me, and the true love story didn’t last, there was more. I sat down with Griffin, manager of the Green Man store in North Hollywood, to ask him what his take was on the card. What I took away from his explanation was that the Moon tarot is responsible for usurping order. In other words, the moon’s light is not its own, but rather a reflection of the sun, and the moon controls the tides, which means that the moon can create magic. The moon can open the doors to magic, to the other realm, and to shifting ones life. This was another eureka! moment. In my adventures in Italy I had hoped to heal my love. I kept my intention broad on purpose. In my life I have had many disappointments with love, and wanted to heal my heart from those experiences. With Griffin telling me that the moon brings madness, chaos that disrupts order as a means of changing the direction of things, basically being a facilitator of magic at its core, and an opening to the realm between the worlds, I was able to fully understand my experiences in Italy. The ceremonies that we had participated in created a form of chaos in each of our lives, and allowed for the magic of healing to be facilitated. In my particular life story I have never been able to say what my needs were, I was never able to stand in my truth in a love relationship and say, “No, this is what I need.” I have always bent my needs to the needs of others. This lesson was finally learned with the help of the moon. Bringing about the magic spell of a true love story that had all the ingredients for a joyful relationship except for my needs being met, and a foundation of truth, gave me an opportunity to learn my lesson. The moon changed the trajectory of my own personal order, which was not actually healthy for me, and allowed me the experience of reclaiming (or maybe claiming for the first time) my truth, and standing in it. I was under a spell, a spell of healing my love, and for that I am grateful to the moon, and the Moon tarot card. The Moon creates a crossroads, a space between the worlds, for one to stand in their truth and create magic. It is at this place that we must trust our guts (or intuition) and stand in the knowledge that we carry because the moon also says that not all the cards are on the table, but you know your cards, and you must stand strong in their truth. The moon calls you to be brave, to heed her calling and venture between the worlds, and in this space to commune with the very core of who you are. Are you ready to change trajectories? It’s an amazing, wonderful ride if you’re willing to be brave enough to embark on the journey. Blessed Be, and Hayaya!  I watched 'The Seventh Son' the other day, and though I thought Julianne Moore was AMAZING, I was a bit disappointed that I was watching yet ANOTHER movie that portrays witches as evil, and needing to be killed. Jeff Bridges plays the witch slayer, a man that believes the inquisition was justified. In fact, the whole movie rests on the premise that witches are doomed to become evil, and everything in history that has sought to destroy witches has been justified.
I know, I know, I know: It's just a movie. BUT movies carry ideas into the collective consciousness, and it is commonly thought that witches are evil, even today. Sometimes my students will say really offensive things to me when they find out I'm a witch because they assume that I am into evil stuff. I am not evil, I am empowered. I believe that I am not a victim to circumstance, but an agent in creating my own life. In my understanding a witch is someone who casts magick. Magick is the ability to manifest something physically from an ethereal energy put out into the world. Magick can be helpful, or harmful, and sometimes a mixture of both. It is the duty of the witch to be constantly evolving and ethically concerned in order to make sure they are not casting harmful magick. I also believe it is the duty of mundane human beings to also be checking in with their motivations, ethics, and evolution. But, are witches inherently bad, and seduced by power? No. Modern western society, that has been indoctrinated into Christianity (as interpreted by the people in power) have been taught to forgo their power. Witches will seek power, because accumulation of power transforms reality. Power does not equal power over others, simply the power to change one's own life. Those who do not seek out power are not a threat to the people in charge. This actively works against the best interest of the masses. Portraying witches as evil has nothing to do with witches actually, it seems to be more about keeping the majority disconnected from their own power. Think about it... xoxo Giana  I am a witch. Sometimes when I reveal this fact I am met with the question,"Well, you're a white witch, right?" the trembling fear baring audible under their breath.
I generally respond,"Actually, I'm more of an olive complexion" which is a play on words, and not an answer to what is being asked. When people ask me if I’m a white witch they are asking if I am a ‘good witch’ (as opposed to evil). Let’s, for a moment, ignore the fact that calling a witch white as a means of inferring goodness has an inherent racist connotation. I find it humorous to ask a witch if they are good because we generally don’t walk around asking our friends, family, or co-workers, if they are good people, and in essence that’s the exact question that is being asked. Yes, I think I’m a pretty decent human being, but I’m not an enlightened being living among mere mortals. I have not achieved buddha, I am not a saint, and I am not otherwise without human fault and folly. My magick is a reflection of me as a person, which isn’t all good (if we’re gonna be completely honest with ourselves, no one is). I do make efforts to try and follow guidelines in order to not cast baneful magick, just as people (I hope) make efforts not to be bad people. Magick is not inherently good or evil, it is a way of working with the energies of the universe in complete participation. One’s magick becomes stronger the more mana (or raw energy) they have access to or accumulated. A person can be born with strong magick and never be trained in the use of it. That person’s thoughts will sometimes be projected out into the ethers as a magick spell, and sometimes they will have bad thoughts. Do you understand? Yes, I am a witch. If I was a bad witch do you think I’d actually tell you? Hahaha. If you were a witch would you cling to an idea of complete goodness in everything you do? If so, I would ask that you look up shadow work, and get to know yourself truthfully! Cheers! Giana ps. If I ever do call myself a white-witch it means that the marketing devils have gotten to me. |
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