By Mabh Savage
This time last year I was delighted to be at Waterstones, launching my latest book, Pagan Portals: Celtic Witchcraft. As well as speaking about the book, and treating everyone to some mead and my mum’s delicious cakes, I popped in a few little spells for people to try out. I tried to keep the theme of the magic around Beltane; fire, transformation and renewal. I also tried to keep the spells as simple as possible, using easy to source ingredients and tools. As a Celtic witch, I try to use whatever comes to hand for my magic, as this can be a very instinctive way to work.
Beltane Flour Spell
You will need some flour, a pebble or stone, a bowl and some green food colouring.
Beltane is a time for transformation. Think of something you would like to transform. This could be a difficult situation in your life, your own mental state, or something more tangible like a position at work. There are two versions of this thing; what it is, and what you wish it to be.
Pick up a stone. Visualise what is; the thing you wish to change as it is now. Imagine the stone is this thing. Hold this idea as close as you can, then push the stone into the bowl of flour.
The stone is now part of this bowl of flour. How do you know? Pick the bowl up. Does the stone fall out? No!
Now you can transform it. Pick up the food colouring and drip three drops into the white flour. Visualise your end goal, and repeat as you feel necessary.
The flour is coloured, forever changed. The flour is no longer white; it is green, the vibrant colour of growth and healing. You may place the bowl in a sacred space, as a reminder of your goal, or bury it deep in the earth.
Celtic Binding
You will need ribbons of green, black, red and white.
Binding can be physical or metaphysical. We bind our hands together to symbolise unity, for example, at a hand-fasting. And we are bound by laws, taboos and geas, the Celtic notion of ‘something that must be’. A geas can be a task, a forbidden action or a word that compels us. It is unbreakable; it binds us.
Take your ribbons, hold them, feel the material in your fingers. Feel how supple yet strong they are. Look at the colours; what do they mean to you?
In Celtic terms red is fire, passion, blood and magic itself, particularly prophecy and poetry. Black is earth, the material world, and the boundaries between things. White is the underworld, the dead, ancestors and the beginning of transformation. Green is growth, imagination, healing and emotion.
Using these correspondences, or whichever colour correspondences are special to you, you can create your own magic with these ribbons. Concentrate on something you want, and tie a knot each time you visualise your goal coming to fruition. If your goal has several aspects, try plaiting several colours together, all the while either visualising or verbalising your intent. Chanting can help here to cement your will, and instil the ribbons with your intent. You can wear a plaited ribbon around your wrist, to keep your magic close to you. You can also give it to another. My parents bound several ribbons together to create a success charm for me, and it still lives in my sacred space at home.
May your will be true this month of May.
You can buy a copy of Mabh’s Celtic Witchcraft book here – AMAZON US AMAZON UK INDIEBOUND