Solitary Wicce

It’s not that I don’t like groups or anything, but I began my life as a witch, or wicce, as we were called in old Europe in solitary fashion. I was eight years old, and without a built in coven in my family, I had little choice in the matter. I prefer that term, wicce, because it lends a certain Akashic reality to it all, but witch is more current and understood. I have Druid heritage, and the terms volvur or volva as well as seidr resonate. These were seers, wand-carriers, typically women, although there were some men who felt this calling. They were revered by all and traveled the countryside offering divination and healing to whomever required it. They were the witches and shamans of their time, even guiding those in battle, instructing them on battle strategy and the best time for attack. Even Julius Caesar remarked that these women had an impact on battle planning. They were a welcome and necessary part of everyday life.

Then things changed and witches were demonized. Instead of viewing them as the necessary healers and midwives they all were, they were relegated to torture and death, brought forth by the church and the various royal families that participated as well. I have a foot in both camps, as it were. I’m related to some who burned, as well as to the royal blood line who ordered them killed. I have always, however, been as I am, so I would have found a way to continue on as many did, underground, but still providing healing to the community in which I lived. Witches/Herbalists are like that. We don’t go quietly and we always find a way.

I’ve always stood apart, so the idea of belonging to a coven doesn’t really interest me. Although it would surely be fun, and I know I would learn so much from everyone involved, I’ve been on my own for nearly fifty-eight years and I’m not sure that I would blend well with others at this point. Crones are like that. We’ve seen much and we have little patience for drama. Witches don’t suffer fools gladly anyway, but a witch in her Crone years, watch out. We’re a force to be reckoned with and you’ll never see us coming.

I’ve never quite understood having too much structure anyway. Wicca is lovely, and they’re a fountain of correspondence information, as are other traditions, and many of the invocations are so beautiful. As a Hedgewitch, the Green Witch tradition is similar to how I see myself given it’s herbalist roots. My focus has always been on herbs and knowing. An empath by birth, I’ve always seen everything at once, feeling in later for detail. Energy moves, and since we’re energy, we also move. Our thoughts move and focus into form on some level. Distance and time are an illusion. Whether we’re casting spells or invoking the Goddess, we’re connecting on an energetic level in order that our purpose is achieved.

The same premise is true of martial arts and energy healing techniques. In Kenpo as well as other styles, we move energy, ours and our opponent’s, when we defend ourselves. I remember the first time my chi was invoked. Everything came together in one motion and the next thing I knew, the other guy was on the floor, which in our first dojo was concrete. In our second dojo, we eventually had dense foam padding underneath carpeting which made falling infinitely nicer, but when things move in Kenpo, they really move and people tend to go flying or directly to the ground. When chi invokes, there’s little the other person can do to stop it except hold on for the ride. Parents experience it when their toddler wants down. It’s happening whether the parent wants it or not. Energy plus intention aligned with single minded purpose beats reaction every time.

With energy healing, Reiki in my case, energy is channeled through the practitioner, drawn by the recipient to wherever it’s needed. It’s cool because the Reiki practitioner receives a session as one is given, and frankly is something everyone needs to know how to do. We’re all extensions of Source Energy. We’re primarily nonphysical, unfocused energy, our bodies the smallest, focused part of who we are. There’s simply no reason why we cannot heal ourselves energetically. It doesn’t mean that you don’t use herbs, food, lifestyle or modern medicine, but that you bring a wholistic approach to your life. Healing should really be more about prevention and making good choices from the outset that promote health and longevity, instead of continually behind the eight ball, chasing healing that should be our normal state. Becoming a Reiki Master should be something everyone does. Reiki is universal life force. It’s who we are expressed into physical form. We are not separate from it and we channel it naturally.

When people ask us who we are, we typically respond with what we do. Who are you..I’m a school teacher, not I’m a happy, loving, honest, creative person. But I wonder if maybe what we do should reflect who we are. So many times we work in jobs that make us miserable, or stay in friendships that aren’t uplifting, or live in places that we don’t feel safe. Yet we do it all anyway, telling ourselves that we can’t get out of the situation we’re in, that we’re stuck somehow. We live outside our alignment with Source when we let this happen, when we don’t live consciously and make the choices we need to make in order that we’re happy. Because it really is okay to be happy. You don’t have to feel guilty or wait for one thing or another to happen, just live your truth and be happy now.

As a solitary witch, I’ve lived my truth in secret for most of my life. There were tells of course, but I don’t think anyone really put two and two together and came up with, oh she’s a witch or anything like that until I came clean about it a few years ago. Living one’s truth doesn’t necessarily involve the trappings found in other expressions. Sometimes it’s how you see the world as part of you, feeling its presence and your connection to it. It’s hearing the wind as it sings its song and knowing it was for you. It’s feeling the sun as it warms your face and the lifeforce it brings. It’s becoming part of the expansiveness of an ocean wave as it crashes to shore, its motion governed by the blessed Moon in all her majesty. It’s in the planting of seeds, tending them as they grow into nourishing fruits and vegetables, or herbs to heal our body and our spirit. It’s watching my children as they grew, becoming the men they are today. It’s watching the spider as she spins her web, and touching the bees in their hive as they vibrate with intensity and love.

It’s knowing that we’re all one, that we’re all one in the love of Source and feeling that oneness, that unity, that resonance. A witch feels this..is this.

And as it is..so shall it be

~Blessings to all!