Remember as a kid mixing up a batch of magic potion in the tub using those colorful cups? This author recalls doing so in brightly colored, metal cups while singing, “Lotion, potion, who’s got the motion?” Don’t ask.
Witches utilize potions for spellcasting and healing; some are meant to be consumed, while others can be poured into a soothing bath or used during a ritual. Potions are simply mixtures of herbs and plants with water, or perhaps alcohol, that act as infusions for the herbal properties. You choose the in gredients based upon your needs, and experimentation is required to get a potion just right. Remember the song “Love Potion Number Nine”? One has to wonder what kinds of results came from the first eight attempts!
The word “potion” comes from the Latin word potio, which means “drink” and has always been associated with magic and medicinal uses. A potion requires a specific recipe of ingredients to bring about the desired effect. Potions in the old days could include some pretty disgusting ingredients, such as the eye of newt or the brain of a crow. Fingernails, hair clippings, and even human feces were common ingredients thought to empower the potion with amazing properties to draw someone in love or lust. Blood, especially from a menstruating woman, was another favorite ingredient, although not so much for the person who had to drink the mix. Potions were used to poison someone, as often, they were to draw someone to you, and many were said to cause the receiver to slip into a deep sleep resembling a coma.
Potions were also popular with occultists and practitioners of alchemy, trying to turn base metals into precious gold. Many a wandering traveler would have a cartful of potions said to cure all kinds of ailments. Potions then took on the reputation of a type of medical quackery thanks to the charlatans out peddling them to the masses, but for many kitchen witches, potions could heal and were designed carefully for the needs of the afflicted. Potions could be given to aid in memory loss, help with vigor in the bedroom, increase fertility, heal wounds, strengthen the immune system, or even render someone invisible if needed.
In the nineteenth century, the curative powers of potions walked a fine line between quackery and a growing enterprise of natural healing modalities that were old in a sense of being practiced by witches and pagans for centuries but new to those who had never imagined that an herbal drink could cure their chronic stomach pains. Though the quacks peddling their cures fell by the wayside, the kitchen witches and herbalists continued to make an impact on their villages and towns as trusted medicine men and women with their apothecaries full of herbal remedies, just like we go to the pharmacy today to ask for something to help our allergy symptoms.
With the variety of herbs and essential oils available, making potions becomes a creative art. Recipes can be kept in your Book of Shadows, but if you aren’t the creative type or don’t have time to mix up a batch, feel free to go online and find potion recipes in books and witchy websites. Often, these recipes are tried and true, so you know you won’t make something toxic or disgusting to the taste buds.
A magic potion might conjure up some images of bizarre ingredients such as eye of newt or crow’s brain, but today herbs and other less cringy items are preferred.
In addition to Moon water, rainwater that has been charged during a thunderstorm has incredible power when used in cleansings, spells, baths, rituals, and blessings. Put a large jar or container out in the open during a storm to catch the water. Do not drink it unless you boil it first, but you can use it for a variety of reasons to increase the potency of your craft work.
You don’t need a ton of tools. You will need a pot, pan, or cauldron for mixing up the ingredients cold or over a flame. Make sure that whatever you choose is safe to be heated. You can use an athame or sacred spoon for stirring and a strainer for separating the herbs and plant matter from the medicinal juices you want. Also, have a glass jar or bottle ready and a base liquid to mix your potions with. This can be water, alcohol, or even a favorite juice drink. Keep in mind the sugar content of juices, though. If using water, be sure to use purified or distilled or, even better, Moon water that you’ve prepared ahead of time.
First, decide how the potion will be used. Will you rub it into your skin like a lotion? Will you drink it or offer it to another to drink? Will it be poured into a bath? The ingredients you use must be free of allergens and nontoxic both to the skin and if consumed. Some witches like to mix their potion in gredients over a heat source, and others mix them cold and then leave them in the direct sunlight for several hours.
Prepare your space or kitchen by first saging or cleansing it with crystals. Make sure your tools are clean and have been purified, too. You might want to burn a favorite cleansing incense as you work and pass tools and items through the smoke.
Pour your base liquid into your pot, pan, or cauldron, and stir in the herbs as you speak spells and incantations over it. You want to warm up the mix, not boil it. If making a potion tea, then yes, boil it, but be sure it’s cool enough before you consume it. Throw in your herbs, flowers, plant parts, and any other ingredients, and stir with your spoon or athame while spellcasting for what you desire. Your words will infuse the potion with energetic power.
Then, strain out the plant parts with a metal strainer or fine cheesecloth, and put the liquid potion portion into the glass jar or bottle. Seal it tight if not using right away. Toss the used plant parts into your compost pile or garden. Let the potion cool down to room temperature before using, or store it in the fridge. Depending on the ingredients, plan to use it within three days. If you included alcohol as your base liquid, it will last for a week refrigerated.
Potions are great to use on your altar; poured into a bath; rubbed into the skin; put into a spritzer bottle and sprayed on the face, hair, or around the home for magical purposes or to make it smell better; for scrying water or divination work; or even consumed as a tea or infusion. You can share a potion for love with a desired mate or offer a potion for soothing skin to a friend as a gift. Use small, decorative jars and bottles, and tie a colorful ribbon around the neck.
In fairy and folk tales, potions were used for bringing love but also for poisoning a pretty princess. They got a rather bad reputation as a weapon instead of as a beneficial tool for spells and rituals. Today’s witch is not about giving someone a potion to make them do their bidding. It’s more about combining specific ingredients to complement and add more power to spellwork or ritual work as well as provide a consumable healing agent for specific illnesses utilizing herbs and plant parts.
Fairy tales such as the story of Snow White help create a reputation of potions being used to hurt people rather than help them.
The truth is, every time you mix a cocktail or create some new kind of iced tea or drink, you are concocting a potion for your pleasure (some call them elixirs). Witches add in some magical elements to their potions via herbs that have the right properties to bring them love, success, money, luck, or good health.
As medicinals, potions are often called philters. They can be used to restore sexuality and vitality or increase attraction, as in an aphrodisiac, and to bring about healing of an illness by using a variety of herbs and plant parts. In mythology and literature, it was always the witch or local medicine man/woman or mage who mixed up the philters or potions given to the villagers for everything from getting rid of a cold to making them invisible to a person who was pursuing them. Like the village shaman, those in need of help would ask for a spell or ritual and something to drink or burn at home in the same way we go to modern doctors to get medical advice and a prescription. Love potions have always been the most popular, and usually, the person making the potion must also get the desired one to drink it as well for it to work. Modern witches know that isn’t usually possible, so they make potions that affect the one drinking it to bring about desired changes or outcomes.
A potion can be purely magical, purely medicinal, or a combination of the two. If it is for healing, for example, it makes sense to create a potion that works on the cause of the illness and strengthens the person’s mindset at the same time. In olden times, villagers believed that illness was the result of curses and hexes or negative spirit attachments, and potions were mixed to attack the negative energies as well as heal the damage they did physically. This is why potions of old included such disgusting and horrific ingredients as menstrual blood, bugs, bones, and other unmentionables, all directed at battling disease on the physical and psychic fronts.
Today’s witch might think about buying premade potions online instead of making his or her own, but the possibility exists of negative attachments with the bottles, packaging, and product itself. It’s necessary to always do a quick cleansing over anything you buy online before consuming, and always be sure to ask for all ingredients, including fillers. Buy from a reputable store that has great reviews and that other witches have spoken positively about. One great thing about social media is that it allows witches to gain access to other like-minded individuals for referrals and references for everything from potions to candles to the best place to find a good spell template.
Earth. Water. Air. Fire. Spirit. Witches work with the five elements in spellcasting, casting a sacred circle, rituals, and celebrations. The five elements represent the energies of matter and how that energy manifests in nature. Earth symbolizes the ground we walk upon and the plants that grow from the soil. Water represents the rain, oceans, rivers, or any other body of water or water source. Air is the air we breathe. Fire is the process of combustion that creates and destroys. Spirit is the unifier that pulls them together, the aether that encompasses all things, like the Kingdom of Heaven in the Christian Bible.
The concept of elements could no doubt be quite old as our primitive ancestors came to understand the different forces and types of energy and matter present, even if they couldn’t scientifically understand them. In the fifth century B.C.E., Greek philosopher Empedocles theorized that everything was made up of the four basic elements, and this concept evolved over the centuries via occult and mystery teachings, which later included the fifth element of the invisible aether or force (think Star Wars) that unifies all things.
Each element is paired with one of the four cardinal directions. Earth corresponds with North. Water corresponds with West. Air corresponds with East. Fire corresponds with South. The Spirit is at the center. Some covens and traditions use different correspondences, but the goal is the same. Often in rituals and spellwork, a witch will acknowledge the proper direction if working with a particular element and stand facing north to work with the grounded, centered energies of Earth as represented by the physical body or facing east when dealing with the energies of air and the mind and intellect. When casting a sacred circle to work within, a witch will call upon all four elemental directions and stand in the center as the spirit figure. This is called “calling the elemental quarters” or “calling the quarters.”
A 1472 illustration from De rerum natura showing the four elements as hypothesized by Empedocles.
The five elements make up the points on the pentacle, a powerful symbol of witchcraft that represents the human body. A great way to commune with the elements is to spend time in nature hiking near a lake or at the beach. The exception to this is fire; perhaps a nice firepit or fireplace roaring on a cold night is the best way to get to know fire safely. Even in nature, though, you may see signs of a past fire that allowed the old brush to be cleared away for new growth. This is also a way to build respect and reverence for the elements. When you see evidence of the power of the ocean waves, the devastation of a wildfire, or experience high winds or an earthquake, you suddenly become very aware of water, fire, air, and earth in a way you probably just ignored before. Witches always live with such an awareness of both the benefits of the elements and their destructiveness.
Elements are also represented by elementals—four classes of particular entities that inhabit the natural world and can be called upon for spellcasting and healing work. Call upon the elementals when you need more insight, balance, and assistance with the characteristics they embody or if you are in nature doing craft work as a way of respecting their domain while you forage for herbs or plants. The elementals are beings of the earth, the air, the water, and the fire. Spirit guides and elementals can also be turned to for guidance and direction that are reminiscent of the animal and spirit guides of Native Americans and shamans. These are interdimensional beings that are not human but are a part of the hidden realms that Earth exists within.
Elementals have taken their rightful place in folklore, fairy tales, and stories about nymphs, mermaids, gnomes, goblins, and winged fairies that flit through the air. We know of them by their appearances in pop culture—in movies, books, and television shows—not realizing that they have a much deeper and older origin as symbolic creatures of the four directions in ceremonial magic.
Earth witches stand their ground and are themselves grounded and dedicated to their craft. They relate well to trees, grass, rocks, mountains, crystals, and animals that roam Earth. They have great skills at protection spells, wealth spells, healing spells, and strength spells. They are drawn to working with herbs, crystals, gemstones, and stones.
Air witches love the sky and stars. They love feeling free and as though they have wings. They love to smudge and do wind magic and knot magic, and they are drawn to communicating with spirits and banishing spells. They work well with birds as animal guides and always see the bigger picture from a higher perspective.
Fire witches are passionate, opinionated, and draw their powers from the Sun, candles, flames, and burning incense. They work well with creative endeavors, sex magic, success spells, love spells, and spells for destroying old patterns that no longer serve them or others. They love to be consumed by life.
Water witches are flexible, fluid, and go with the flow of life. They love all watery places, especially the ocean, and enjoy picking up seashells. They work well with Moon water spells, love spells, and healing spells and have incredible intuition.
So much of what embodies the witch’s practice involves correspondences between things, entities, forces, energies, and objects. Symbolism is powerful, and witches believe that everything is symbolic of some aspect of human existence whether it is an inanimate rock or candle or a living thing, such as an elemental or animal guardian spirit.
Correspondences with the elements include:
• Earth—The north; the pentacle; the female principle; fertility; darkness; practicality; materialism; responsibility; groundedness; the colors black, brown, and green; the metal gold; rocks and minerals; nature magic; cord magic; gemstones; winter; midnight; night rituals; business and prosperity; work and success; stability; fertility; and wild places; associated with gnomes, dwarves, trolls, and creatures of inner Earth.
• Air—The east; the wand, athame, or sword; the intellect; achievements and endeavors; frivolity; the mind; the color yellow and sometimes white; the metal silver; oils and incenses; the sky; the wind, storms, and clouds; the sunrise and springtime; thoughts and ideas; traveling; freedom; the truth; psychic abilities and communicating with others via the mind; associated with sylphs, zephyrs, and fairies.
• Water—The west; the cup or chalice; receptiveness; sensitivity; introspection; fertility; fluidity; the emotions; the colors gray and blue; the metal silver; potions and infusions; watery places, such as the oceans, lakes, and rivers; dreamwork; sleep; plants; the autumn and sunsets; healing; working with emotions; communion with the spirit world; marriage and fertility; associated with undines, mermaids and mermen, nymphs, and fairies that live in watery places.
• Fire—The south; the male principle; the athame or sword; action; bravery; strength; jealousy; anger; warring; the colors white and red; the metal gold; candles and incense; burning and fire; cleansing and purifying; lamps and lights; summertime; high noon; freedom; vision and perception; illumination; enlightenment; energy; healing; destruction; associated with salamanders and firedrakes.
The four main elements have crystals and stones that correspond with each of them:
• Earth—agate, calcite, carnelian, diamond, granite, jade, onyx, jasper, ruby, jet, malachite, tourmaline, sugilite, tiger’s eye
Basic symbology for the four elements of fire, air, water, and earth.
• Air—aquamarine, amethyst, beryl, azurite, blue lace agate, citrine, diamond, fluorite, hematite, pearl, lazurite, sapphire, opal, sodalite, snowy quartz, turquoise, topaz, tourmaline
• Fire—amber, bloodstone, beryl, garnet, coal, flint, jasper, obsidian, diamond, pumice, peridot, yellow topaz, smoky quartz
• Water—alexandrite, beryl, chalcedony, jet, lapis lazuli, onyx, obsidian, Moonstone, rose quartz, opal, peridot, sardonyx, magnetite, tourmaline, turquoise, zircon
Some basic color correspondences are:
• White—purity, cleansing, calm, innocence, new beginnings, spiritual illumination; used in cleansing rituals, to gain clarity, to clear out negative energies, and to bring peace to a chaotic situation.
• Black—the end of something, change, transformation, shadow self, protection, stability; used to banish negative energies and entities, in transformation rituals for spiritual enlightenment, and to meet and work with the shadow self.
• Blue—peace, calm, happiness, balance, wisdom, patience, protection; used in healing spells and rituals to bring harmony and balance, to improve psychic skills and divination ability, and to calm a chaotic situation.
• Green—money, nature, abundance, renewal, growth; used in spells and rituals for prosperity, financial increase, fertility, getting a job, career growth, personal growth, and good fortune.
• Red—love, passion, devotion, ambition, power, joy, desire, sexuality; used to bring love and affection, to increase passion, and to deal with anger and extreme emotions; brings good luck with fertility and marriage; increases ambition and self-esteem, builds leadership skills, and adds powerful emotional energy to intention work.
• Pink—love, affection, friendship, companionship, healing; used to bring a romance into your life, to heal, to build self-love, to increase harmony and balance, to empower new beginnings, to create bonds and partnership, and to help children and animals.
• Yellow—energy, vitality, fertility, imagination, inspiration; used in spells for confidence, better health, fertility, returning vigor and vitality, to increase access to the imagination, and in divination and communication with others; brings more productive energy and creativity into all matters.
• Orange—vibrancy, vigor, power, health, stimulation, attraction; used to attract love, success, money, and good fortune; brings power and courage; helps deal with changes and challenges; brings mental clarity and happiness; increases opportunities; assists in legal matters.
• Purple—elevated, enlightenment, spiritual wisdom, idealism; used in divination and to balance sensitivities, restore equilibrium, gain wisdom, and put ideas into practice.
• Gold—prosperity, wealth, success, masculine energy, inner strength, understanding, self-realization; used in spells and rituals to bring about success in all areas of life, embrace the masculine Sun energy, build inner confidence and strength, and become a self-actualized person and leader.
• Silver—Moon energy, feminine energy, intuition and divination, wisdom; used to work with the Moon and feminine divine, increase intuitive and divination skills, and to gain wisdom and enlightenment; used in spells to uncover secrets and build psychic powers.
• Brown—security, groundedness, friendship, animal and nature magic, harvest, endurance, strength, abundance; used in spells for strength and endurance during challenges, for abundance of all good things, for building friendships; used in animal and nature magic and in rituals celebrating the harvest, soil, gardens, and Earth.
Each day of the week is connected to a different celestial body, color or colors, and types of spells and rituals that work best.
• Monday is the day of the Moon. The colors are blue, white, and silver. This is the best day for casting spells for wisdom, insight, intuition, advanced psychic abilities, and dreams.
• Tuesday is the day of Mars. The colors are black, red, and orange. Cast spells for courage, strength, banishing, and protection.
• Wednesday is associated with Mercury. The colors are orange and purple. This is the best day for spells for luck, wealth and money, and wisdom.
• Thursday is connected to Jupiter. The colors are green, blue, and purple. Do spells for protection, healing, and increasing prosperity.
• Friday is associated with Venus. The colors are pink, red, and white. Cast spells for love and friendship.
• Saturday is the day of Saturn. The colors are black and purple. This is a great day for protection spells, banishing and cleansing spells and rituals, and binding spells.
• Sunday is the day of the Sun. The colors are yellow and gold. Spellcast for wealth, health, and success in all things.
Even the times of days each have their own correspondences:
• Morning is a good time for spells and rituals for spiritual awakening, growth, balance, blessings, and cleansings.
• Daytime is great for protection, growth, success, opportunity, and health.
• Evening is best for banishing and releasing, creativity, and finding love and friendship.
• Night is best for divination, healing, wisdom, dream work, and love spells.
• Midnight is a great time for recovery, releasing spells and rituals, and ending spells.
Seasons are also associated with their own elements and properties:
• Summer is the time of fire, perfect for energy work, purification, finding passion and purpose, banishing, and prosperity spells and rituals.
• Autumn is the time of water, cleansing, spiritual work, astral travels, and spells for protection and peace.
• Winter is the time of Earth and best for rest, dream work, grounding, spells to assist the deceased, and setting goals.
• Spring is the time of air, spells for growth, wisdom, new beginnings, fertility, and healings.