Maiden vs. Crone in American Society: Confessional Pt.1

It is time to begin revealing this secret...please bear with me during this process. I promise you that these revelations can alter your own magickal life, once I get to the bottom of it all.

So...let's be real here. My journey "home" to Paganism may have been symbolized to me in dreams as a child, but the day my magickal journey TRULY began was on April 29, 2015, when I so happened to come across an interesting profile on SpellsofMagic.com. Basically, I began exchanging messages with another member of the Craft online (big surprise in this day and age, right?). While I wasn't expecting much, this person and I found that we had many views of witchcraft, magick, and our practices in common. From loving alternative lifestyles and our mutual distaste in limiting yourself to following only one Pagan tradition, we began learning about each other swiftly and naturally. We both embraced Native American spirituality and were keen on Gothic culture. After several days of non-stop communication, we "graduated" up to the next level by taking our conversation off site.

And when I saw his face for the first time, my heart practically plopped out of my chest in fear.

The delicate lines that stretched across his forehead warned me that I was leading myself astray by involving myself with this man. I was a young woman, keeping up with fast-paced college life while trying to keep myself afloat working part time in retail until graduation came around. Soon enough, I learned he was very much so "established"...a full blown resume of 23 years of work within the construction industry, three sons that are several years older than me, and the fact he was scattered through his own emptiness from the aftermath of a fatal divorce several years prior. Soon enough, he confessed his age. Craig was thirty years my senior! I glanced at his profile picture one more time, and asked myself, "He's much older. This can only lead to no good."

Of course, my mind was hungry for knowledge, my heart thirsty to learn more wisdom about my spiritual path. The opportunity never arose for me to find a spiritually-experienced mentor. Craig seemed willing, almost eager to teach me something new. And so I sat with it, my phone constantly being blown up with enthusiastic messages. And somehow, in my mind I knew what I was getting myself into could be considered "wrong", but my inner voice kept begging me to keep engaging with this person. Having been raised in a conservatively Christian household where my "old-fashioned" parents frowned down upon Internet friendships, I sealed myself away in quiet contemplation of this newfound friendship I was dragging myself into. And so it began...and went on....and continued on. There was never a day I was spiritually "alone" anymore. He took me under his wing and instructed me on how to master using my first Oracle deck. At first, it felt like nothing. I was practically learning a new witchy "trade", if you will. These casual lessons stretched into long nights of widened eyes as I began to have more accurate readings on my own. Strangely, his card readings seemed to intertwine with mine, all too well. We began asking our decks questions about our friendship and the results were eerie each time, on both ends. After several weeks of us exchanging card readings and knowledge, we took it a step further. I learned something interesting.

He lives in Australia. I am in America. Only after one month of talking, we became inseparable. It was on our "one month anniversary" of talking that we decided it was time to test something out. Both of us being curious about our card readings matching up so well, we decided to attempt participating in a ritual together, 10,000 miles apart, through Skype. I must admit, I was the one who discussed the possibility of such a ritual even working. We were both aware that we could attempt it, but I feel as if we both became healthy skeptics. For that initial ritual, we planned it would simply be a "sending" ritual to "blend" or "merge" our energy together to begin casting spells together in a magickal union, as two witches working towards similar spiritual goals.

It was on this day that we would eventually discover the blissful magick that the Maiden and the Crone (or, better yet, let's call him Mage) can achieve together when working in sync and spiritual rhythm. Allow the Maiden and the Mage to come together to share this story with you all, for better or for worse...

My Confessional: I've Been Keeping A Secret...

Hello and blessings, everyone...

This is going to be a lengthy update post. Once again, life slapped me in the face. I'm not going to list out all the reasons for why I've been on a hiatus yet again, but I will also not be able to promise that I'll return to regular postings yet due to the fact I have been under a heavily tense situation for the last seven or so weeks of my life. I've been forced to truly reflect and focus on myself, my goals, and what my seemingly uncertain future holds personally and as a writer. Surely soon enough, you will understand my major reason for this absence.

I have been silently lying to all that may come across my content.

I have a secret. A huge secret in regards to my Pagan practices that I have been yearning to expose on this blog for quite some time. Due to personal circumstances, I could not dare to risk publishing it out to the world to see and bear. It is at this time I have decided that it is time to be honest with any readers I may still gain, or to anyone that stumbles across my work that finds an interest in exploring my posts. I have lied to you all, silently and reluctantly. As I now begin to finally embrace my spiritual self wholeheartedly, I am desperately eager to make this transition with my content. This blog has been tainted, twisted from the ultimate truths of my own spiritual life that may help or encourage others. Guilt strikes me. I only buried it away to protect myself, both physically and emotionally from struggles. But the struggles became a reality, and the lying has ceased to exist...to my family, my friends, and everyone I associate with within the Pagan community and outside of it.

I will have to make a mini "Confessionals" series of posts to update you on the entire story. It is too long to squeeze into one post. While I slowly begin to work on writing these posts out, I will be throwing in unrelated content. I have gained much more knowledge since my last post. I think taking some time away overall will help you all due to the wisdom I've gained. I will also be working on establishing myself more in the Pagan community, online and offline.

Be prepared for a wild ride. I will try to upload the Confessionals on a consistent basis. Also, I will be putting this website under further construction to improve your visit here. As for the unrelated posts, these are some topics you can expect to appear here in the next week or so. I will be uploading content regularly within the next week for sure. Here are the topics as follows:

1) Introducing my Christian friend into the world of witchcraft: how that went, how you can educate your Christian loved ones, and so forth.

2) Creating Flying Ointment.

3) Making a Medicine Bag, spell/ritual writing tips, surviving your Year And A Day experience, etc.)

4) My Samhain ritual and how to improve your Sabbat rituals. 

Until then, please take care and I promise you that when the Confessionals are finally published, there WILL be a Midnight Candle Youtube channel I plan on starting to make this content more accessible for those of you that don't have much time to read posts. The YouTube channel will be a project I'll be slowly gravitating towards in the next six months, but I'll leave updates when I can about it's progress.

Perspective From A (Sort Of) Satanist

Perspective From a (Sort of) Satanist

Pentagrams, the devil, sacrifice of animals, and evil are all associated with Satanism. But why? What is Satanism really? Is it truly evil? The answer is no, not at all! In this post I’ll cover the basics of Satanism and what it really means.

The Church of Satan was founded on April 30, 1996 by Anton LaVey. LaVey is also the author of the Satanic Bible. The belief of LaVeyan Satanism is that each person is their own god. Satanists don’t actually believe in the devil. Say it with me; "Satanists do NOT believe in the devil!" Satan is used as a symbol to represent pride, individualism, and the idea of indulgence rather than abstinence.

Could you possibly have anything in common with a belief system wrongfully associated with so much evil? Do you believe that you should not harm children? Do you believe you should show respect to other people when you are in their home? Are you against rape? If you answered yes to these, then you agree with three out of eleven Satanic Rules of Earth.

Below is a list of the eleven rules.

1. Do not give opinions or advice unless you are asked.
2. Do not tell your troubles to others unless you are sure they want to hear them.
3. When in another’s lair, show him respect or else do not go there.
4. If a guest in your lair annoys you, treat him cruelly and without mercy.
5. Do not make sexual advances unless you are given the mating signal.
6. Do not take that which does not belong to you unless it is a burden to the other person and he cries to be relieved.
7. Acknowledge the power of magic if you have employed it successfully to obtain your desires. If you deny the power of magic after having called upon it with success, you will lose what you have obtained.
8. Do not complain about anything to which you need not subject yourself.
9. Do not harm little children.
10. Do not kill non-human animals unless you are attacked or for your food.
11. When walking in open territory, bother no one. If someone bothers you, ask him to stop. If he does not stop, destroy him.

Not bad rules to live by! Now you see that Satanism is in no way evil and should not be treated as such. If you’d like me to go more in depth on this topic, leave a comment below! If you like this post, share it with your friends.

-Ally

Email: allymidnightcandl3@gmail.com

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