At times you have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the
wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful.
What you'll discover is yourself.
—Alan Alda
In my opinion, intuitive witchcraft is perhaps the best- and worst-kept secret of modern witchcraft. Why is intuitive witchcraft a best-kept secret if phrases containing “intuitive ___” are plastered across almost every social media outlet? In general, while the term is widely used, I have found that it is hard to uncover sources on expanding, deepening, and progressing intuitive witchcraft in an educated and informed manner.
Intuition is not a modern new age term, but is something much richer that has deeper psychological roots. In a 2008 article appearing in the British Journal of Psychology, “Intuition: A Fundamental Bridging Construct in the Behavioural Sciences,” a group of researchers from Leeds University defined intuition as “the result of the way our brains store, process and retrieve information on a subconscious level.” For most of us, the connection to and use of our intuition is natural enough to go unnoticed by our active conscious mind during our day-to-day lives. The way that we interact with our world today impacts our future intuitive responses. In this way, our intuition is constantly taking shape and changing, growing as we do both mentally and spiritually.
In terms of witchcraft, intuition is one of the most useful skills that we can develop. In spellwork, intuition can be tapped into to infuse spells with the magick of the witch. The witch can create spells that are unique to their path that can raise energy and power that is hard to find through other types of magick. As a note, I am in no way saying that prewritten or pre-worked spells aren't “good,” because magick can be found anywhere we make it; however, harnessing the power of intuition in a controlled way can open a level of depth and understanding that we miss by relying fully on others' spellwork.
I have found that most witches call on and use their magickal intuition every day without even realizing it! Every time we recognize, feel, and read a person's energy without having interacted with them, we are calling on the power of our intuition. Some might say that this feeling is a form of psychic ability, but for the average person what they are experiencing is a heightened form of their intuition. In Psychic Witch Mat Auryn describes the difference of intuition and psychic ability, with intuition being “the unconscious processing of sensory information in one's environment to come to a particular conclusion” and psychic ability “the processing of extrasensory perception that doesn't rely on primary sensory information about one's environment.” Auryn goes on to write, “intuition is based on perceivable external environmental information, whereas psychic ability is not.”
In terms of spell crafting, it is often said that a beginner witch needs to learn to walk before they can run. In terms of complexity, intuitive spell crafting is deceptively easy to learn but takes practice to fully master. Many elements go into this type of spellwork such as season (time of year), celestial events, life changes, higher powers, intention, etc. It is important to explore not only what intuitive spell crafting is but also how you can use it to manifest the absolute most in your life and throughout the year!
Intuitive spell crafting is just what it sounds like: it's using intuition to guide and create rituals, spells, and manifestations within your life and the lives of those around you. The unique power of the witch is the ability to manifest with nothing more than their mind, magick, and the power of the universe. That might sound like some new age shtick, something that is simply too good to be true and would never work for the ordinary person, but it's not. This form of connected witchcraft requires a level of trust not only in yourself but in your practice and your understanding of magick.
There is a sacred quality to intuitive spell crafting, a mystery or sacrament in the relationship between witches and the cosmic energies of the universe. To empower your intuition as a guide along the winding road of your practice and personal craft is to make a pact with the elements of nature so that they can be called upon whenever you are working your own personal and unique style of magick.
There are energies where we live and work—spirits, flexible forces as changeable as the weather. When working with these energies, it is necessary to tune into their unique needs and temperaments while knowing that what works today might not work tomorrow.
At birth, the universe provides each of us with our own “gym,” so to speak. This gym is not a physical place or even strictly speaking a spiritual place; it is a place where determination sows the seeds of future spiritual growth. That is to say, each of us is given all of the tools we will need to get in spiritual shape. This gift comes at no cost to us but requires dedication and determination. Some people will get further along in their training than others due to life circumstances and their degree of commitment. The human condition of jealousy and competition has no room here—individuals progress at their own pace regardless of how they decide to show it.
The most common questions asked by those beginning their path of witchcraft usually boil down to a variation on “Am I doing this right?” The question comes in all shapes and sizes: “Can I use this?” “When do I do that?” “What if . . . ?” The list goes on and on. These questions often indicate that someone is going too fast down the path of witchcraft, trying to run before they learn to walk.
Witches don't become skilled in their practice overnight, just as they don't become masters by reading one book. Spiritual skills are akin to a special muscle group; one cannot go to the gym, look at the equipment, walk away, and somehow get in shape without ever touching a single machine. Spiritual growth is the same. It requires time and effort.
To address some of these common questions when beginning to work with a witch's intuition, it is necessary to first learn how to distinguish between the voices of anxiety, ego, and intuition. When you are just starting out, it may be difficult to tell the difference. You have to learn how to truly hear these inner voices of your intuition. When I first started working in a 911 dispatch center, for example, I was amazed that everyone could tell the difference between a true emergency and a nonemergency call just by the tone of voice of the caller. Over time, I could also tell the difference without even trying. This level of unconscious understanding didn't happen overnight for me, and it might not for you, either.
Instinct and intuition can seem similar, yet there are key differences, especially in the realm of conscious knowing and reason. Instinct is a biological reaction to outside stimuli that all animals are born with in order to keep them alive. Examples of instinct might be general fear of heights, dark places, and deep water. We are instinctually cautious in situations like this. Instinct looks and feels like an impulsive urge, a knee-jerk reaction to something occurring around us.
Intuition, on the other hand, is more complex. Intuition is the literal gaining of knowledge without any conscious thinking or reasoning. Intuition hardly ever comes in the form of an impulse. More often it feels like a lazy afternoon breeze flowing through our lives without any effort. The flow of intuition is always present, ready to be tapped into and explored.
The best way to begin working with your intuition is to get in there, get your hands dirty, and get comfortable with it. This might feel awkward at first. Don't let this get in the way of taking the steps to an intuitively connected life. Meet your intuition halfway—it's there waiting for you whenever you're ready to take those preliminary steps into the wild unknown. When I feel a bit disconnected from my intuition, one of my favorite ways to reconnect is through a simple grounding ritual, like the one that follows. As you advance in your practice, you'll have your own grounding rituals for general maintenance of intuition.
GROUNDING RITUAL FOR AWAKENING YOUR INTUITION
First, it's important that you get your mind and body ready—not just your spirit. Set aside some time to take a soothing bath, walk outdoors, prepare a nice meal, or do any other calming, solitary activity. Be intentional about the activity you choose! Once you feel as though you are in a physical, mental, and spiritual place of relative peace and calm, it is time to meet yourself and your intuition.
To begin, go to a place that is mostly quiet where you feel at peace. This might be a room in your house, a hill or mountain, a beach, or anywhere your feel comfortable and will not be disturbed. Sit down with your back straight and your knees bent, feet planted on the ground in front of you. Close your eyes and take a deep breath in. As you exhale, let the clutter of your mind release with your breath. Repeat this a few times.
Once you have quieted your mind, think about a decision or situation you need to face soon. Visualize the event in your mind and listen to the voices that are speaking to you. What are they saying? Try to see if there are any differences in tone or quality of these thoughts.
Filter out the high-energy, high-pitched voices first. For example, if you are starting a new job soon, these thoughts might sound like, I wonder how my new coworkers are. Am I going to be good at this job? What if I don't get along with my boss? Breathe in, and breathe out all of the anxious and nervy thoughts. Those voices are not your intuition and are more closely related to your ego.
Notice the thoughts and voices that remain. This is when you can begin to see the difference between instinct and intuition. Remember that your intuition flows through you like a lazy river, peaceful in its knowledge that it is headed downstream and will get there when it gets there. There is no rush, no impulse to move faster or change course. This is the time to let the voices of your instinct go as well.
What you are left with is the solid conviction of your intuition. Listen to the voice and learn how it feels within you. Spend as much time as you can in this place, sitting with and acknowledging the profound wisdom that the universe shares with each of us. Your intuition is the guiding light of peace that will show you through stormy seas once you have learned to listen to it.
As you become more comfortable tapping into your intuition throughout the day and in all types of situations, listening to that voice will become second nature. However, even for the most practiced, every now and again we all have our doubts. The practical use of intuition is required of all witches, and there is no time more relevant for its use than in ritual and spellwork, selecting supplies, tools, and ingredients. So what exactly is practical intuition? I like to think of it as a compromise between the logical and the unseen. For example, when we pick out ingredients for a spell intuitively, practical intuition would have us realize that maybe we wouldn't put things like rose oil into a spell to sever ties with ex-lovers, like a cord cutting. In this way, we are using practical and logical reason in turn with our intuition to bring about the best set of results.
In my opinion, spellwork (especially intuitive science) is very much a science. Revisiting the theory that intuition is the result of the way our brains store, process, and retrieve information on a subconscious level, intuitive spellwork becomes something practical, measurable, and tangible. When you practice intuitive spellwork, you document what you will be doing and what you will be using, and then journal about the experience afterward. Come back to this entry a week and then a month later to analyze the spellwork, if it was successful and if there was anything that could have been changed. By documenting and revisiting your craft using this method, you are teaching your future intuition how to make better choices based on experience and mistakes. This process is not so dissimilar to the scientific method!
One of my earliest mistakes when I branched into spellwork was paying too much attention to doing things “the right way.” This led to an overemphasis on things that frankly didn't matter and didn't help me progress. What I wish someone would have told me at the time was to not worry about what anyone else says or what is written on the internet. Instead, use the tools and words that are right for you. Just because something worked great for one person doesn't meant that something else couldn't equally work great for you. The more you pay attention to what your intuition has to say, the more the world will manifest for you before your eyes!