Trust yourself.

While the work appears to be outward facing, ultimately, it’s inward facing. In order to be a clear channel for energy, you have to keep clearing your own energies, including your feelings and thoughts. Which essentially makes walking a witchy path quite similar to working with a Jungian therapist. When you get to know yourself and your own inner-worlds of thought and emotion intimately, you’ll begin to trust yourself and your own intuition.

Articles to get you started are: This is How I Call Myself Home, 3 Signs You’re Ignoring Your Intuition, and Don’t Pass the Tissues.

There is an energy which comes from creating your own words, gestures, and prayers! Ruminating on a ritual and letting it percolate within you begins to energize your ideas. So, in Maia’s current reading, she focuses on books which activate her intuition and creativity rather than books on craft, ritual, or spells.

The books below had an impact at the beginning of Maia’s journey. They didn’t tell her what to do necessarily, but they got her thinking in new directions. Note that these are all older books and haven’t been revisited lately to see how they hold up to modern sensibilities!

• The Twelve Wild Swans by Starhawk
• Drawing Down the Moon by Margot Adler
• Herbal Rituals by Judith Berger
• The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
• Barefoot on Holy Ground by Gloria Karpinski
• Owning Your Own Shadow by Robert Johnson
• Story by Robert McKee

My journey to Ireland was all about serendipity and my willingness to follow the dictates of a dream.

Many ask me how I found my teacher and, also, how they can find theirs. My best advice is to keep your eyes and ears open, but don’t force the river… allow it to flow. Brainstorm, do a Google search on your interests, see what names keep coming up for you… then sleep on it a few times.

To hear me tell my story, skip to the 23 minute mark in the episode of Medicine Stories below.

I have a tricky relationship with the word witch and prefer witchy when describing myself… but I suspect this is a difference that is no difference at all. My heart lives at the intersection of the physical world and the spirit world which, when you go back to folk and fairytales, is a crossroad usually inhabited by a woman called witch. Witch has been my awakening, and working with the word has given me a path home to myself.

Read more about my journey with the word witch HERE.