LETTING GO: A HEALING STAGE OF GRIEF

It is normal to feel strong attachments to the physical things someone we love left behind. Those things can quickly become something that we never really put much thought into, toward something that is more precious than gold. But the place to get to with grief is to realize that the one we lost is not in that thing, even for as much as it contains their energy and some part of their essence.

I was painfully reminded of this recently. But first, the back-story: not long after my father died, I went to his wife’s house. I told her that I wanted to go into my dad’s office and take a couple of mementos to have. Instead of her being open to myself OR my siblings, she proceeded to hover over me and question every choice I wanted to make. It was uncomfortable for both of us and brought up a lot of what was toxic in my years-long relationship with her. I eventually put my foot down with her and reminded her that she was not the only one who lost him. That she needed to not be so controlling and allow my father’s children to be able to take a piece of him, to help us deal with the loss.

I only took a couple of my father’s spiritual tools that I know he used because he told me. I took a miniature labyrinth, one of his shirts he was wearing when he died and  a set of meditation balls. The shirt I got made into a Memory Bear. There are people you can send items of your loved one to for them to make into a teddy bear. I cannot tell you how pivotal that bear was to my grief!

Well, a few days ago, I was going through some clothes and putting them away. The items I have from my dad are all on the top of my dresser. It has been a comfort in the years since my father’s death to be able to go to sleep at night and see those things up there. As fate would have it, the dresser was moved away from the wall because of a recent touch up of paint in my apartment.

It was moved away just enough that as I got into putting things away, I suddenly heard two large crashes behind the dresser. I looked down and saw that my father’s meditation balls were on the floor, shattered.

My heart sank. A combination of anger and grief came raging to the fore. I felt like my day went from bad to worst in that moment.

So I sat on my bedside. And I took several deep breaths. And I went inside myself. I connected to my own spirit (which Lucumi and Ifa people call the Ori) and soothed the pain. I started to say to myself that, as sad as this moment was, that my father is not in any of those things. That they are representations of a love that continues beyond the grave. A love deep within me.

The sentences I just wrote don’t do the moment justice. I was sitting there for a minute. A good, long minute. Sometimes you have to. Part of letting go, sometimes, is allowing yourself to feel. To REALLY feel things we tend to avoid, because as I said in my last post, our whole American over-culture is death avoidant. Even the process toward burial has been sanitized and we have been largely removed from interacting with the deceased person’s body until the wake (if we even have one).

There’s no way around grief, except through it. Letting go is a significant part of that. I hope all of us find our way, and remember, through the pain, that the heart of life is still good.

GOOD GRIEF: SOME THOUGHTS ON THE BEREAVEMENT PROCESS

I have been in professional ministry for over 20 years, and more than half of that has been spent serving patients and their families and caregivers in End of Life care. When they learn that that’s my day job, many people immediately say, “Wow…that’s pretty amazing! I could never do that!” This usually makes me chuckle because there are just as many jobs in the world I could never do. But I guess that’s just how it is.

One of the most challenging grief moments I experienced, one that showed me how deep death avoidance can go in a family, was during the last time my father was hospitalized before his death. We all knew he was not doing well by then. But we were not in the same place as a family about handling it. A big chunk of the family was Pentecostal, and their answer to EVERYTHING was to pray, pray, and then give my dad Holy Communion every day (whether he wanted it or not). His pastor never darkened the hospital doorstep, so I became my father's de facto pastor and chaplain.

I did this very reluctantly. My heart was not in doing any spiritual work whatsoever because my heart was breaking at losing one of the most important figures of my life. I remember, most days, it took willpower to keep going to the hospital, wondering if that day would be the last. It eventually came to a head with my family because I was also feeling a lot of emotional distress from being in two significant roles when all I wanted to do was be a son.

So I did what I knew to do. I called a family meeting and declared that I was no longer playing pastor for my dad or family. That if they wanted him to get that sort of spiritual care, they needed to call his pastor and verbally kick that pastor’s ass to get to the hospital and visit his parishioner. That it was unfair to ask me to do it. And that I did not fully agree with the level of anxiety playing itself out with weaponized prayer and overusing the sacrament. I say weaponized prayer because the doctors were telling us his condition was grave. The over-fixation on prayer created familial avoidance where no one was talking about what we were told, let alone beginning to prepare ourselves for losing our family Patriarch.

These are all reasonably typical grief dynamics for a family struggling to accept the loss or impending loss. A lot of people don’t know what to do with their grief. I have heard this and stories similar to my own so much that it made me start to see that, in American culture generally, we are death-avoidant. The epitome of that for me is when I meet a new family that asserts— very strongly—that my hospice colleagues and I are not to tell the patient we work for hospice or that the patient is on hospice themselves. Then I walk into the patient’s room, and the FIRST thing they say is, “So, I know I’m dying. Can we talk about that?”

Like in my family, there is a disconnect. Often, it is well-meaning, too. The adult kids are just being protective of their dying parent’s feelings. They may hold cultural fears that talking about death automatically BRINGS Death faster. Honestly, though, what tends to bring death faster is when everyone in a family is avoiding the talk with their dying loved one, and that loved one knows they are dying. It will make a person start to feel crazy. And sometimes, even when they have lost the ability to communicate verbally, we will see a sudden onset of agitation or restlessness with no medical origin.

This moment can be tricky to move through. It takes finesse. It takes timing and waiting for an opportunity, an opening, by the patient or the family. The chief question on the table is, is the desire to keep the person’s demise that they are already aware of about them, or you? Ironically, most of the dying process can become about the people left behind. To a later point, this makes sense, but in the earlier moments, it must first be about the person dying. Getting there, however, is where hospice clinicians come in.  

All of these issues and more than I can fit in a post are why I made a one-off on this issue. Yes, it is a piece of occult “tech,” but the course shows one way to move through the avoidance toward an approach that honors the person's life. It is the sort of thing, quite honestly, that I wish I had when I was losing people, like the story I told about my dad. It would not have made everything better or spared me my grief. It would have given me proverbial bread and food for the journey, a net to catch the broken pieces of my heart. I, therefore, commend this course to you and encourage you to take it for a whirl if you have this need in your life or expertise. The class can be found here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/good-grief-a-hoodoo-inspired-way-to-move-forward-after-death-comes/.

In the unfortunate losses of your life, may you grieve well.

A REVIEW OF BLUE TIGER’S EYE TAROT

Hey Folx!

I have known Kelly Morris for a few years as we traffic in some of the same spiritual circles. I wanted to write this review of her work and business based on my direct experience with her.

So, I came to Kelly with a particular issue. It was something that, knowing some of her spirituality and practice, I knew she would be helpful with. But as can often be the case with us readers, people come with whatever they come with, but because we work with spirits, they run the show! This was the case with my reading, where even though my questions were eventually answered, Kelly had to focus on other more pressing issues my spirits and hers brought up. What this means is I got the REAL GUIDANCE I needed to get. And it was precisely that. She pointed to more critical pieces of my development with my ancestors and spirit guides that required more attention. That kind of 411 is mission-critical for someone like me because my ancestors and spirit guides are the foundation of my practice and faith. If something needs to be fixed with them, my spiritual house gets wonky. So, I am beyond grateful that she identified those issues.

The other impressive thing about her reading style that I much enjoyed was how deeply she was able to go. Kelly could see the issues and struggles I have had for a long time. She could see them and identify how they connect to what I am trying to do as a worker and priest across my traditions. She could see the web of connections and ensure I got everything necessary there. I have had readings from a few different people over time, and most could not do this. Most readers I have gone to are general in their insights. They can only touch the surface. But Kelly was able to go deep, and I appreciate that.

Finally, and perhaps most important for people to know, is the fact that I believe Kelly can help people gain insight and find what they need to heal deeper ancestral wounds. This is work even less people are capable of identifying. Readers must be able to see on a deep level, not only me and my practice but also how it connects to what someone’s ancestors have been through. Kelly was able to identify this in my family line and all the “ancestral cancers” that follow my family and me that I am primarily tasked with healing. This is not work for the faint of heart. I know it was also not easy for her to give some of the messages to me, but I admire her courage for still doing that. A million thank yous to you, my dear.

Kelly’s site is here: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100057202189903.

If you are feeling lost, confused, or stuck, book a reading with Blue Tiger’s Eye Tarot. You’ll be glad you did!

A REVIEW OF JACK GRAYLE’S PGM PRAXIS CLASS

Hey Everyone!

I have spoken numerous times about this class. I have taken everything Jack teaches except his more one-off-styled class. This class and Hail Hekate were game-changers for me. I tried other teacher’s methods and did not connect to them. Nothing was wrong with the others, but the methods were less grounded in tradition. Or they were not as ritual-based as PGM Praxis was.

One of many things I love about PGM Praxis, perhaps more than most other classes I have taken, is its endless utility. The utility is not a “use it all at once” one. It is the kind where you study intensely with Jack for a year, then find yourself days, weeks, months, even a few years after coming back to the material as life presents its vicissitudes to you. I have used this class’s material for everything from putting a child molester behind bars to healing emotional wounds to procuring spirit allies who help me do the PGM work even more effectively.

This class is where you can learn its tech and build an entire practice around it just by doing PGM work. We are practitioners across several modalities, but some prefer a deep focus. With this class, you can decipher the spells in the PGM. With it, you can take care of many of life’s challenges and what I call as a rootworker crossed conditions. The way you are taught by Jack, even if something is NOT explicitly accounted for in the PGM, you will learn to jailbreak the ancient spells to craft exactly what you need. That is, after all, what those first Late Antiquity PGM Sorcerors did themselves.

So do yourself a huge favor to your craft and hop on into PGM Praxis. The spirits of Late Antiquity are ready for your call!

THE CHAIN OF MANIFESTATION: A SPIRITIST PHENOMENON

Espiritismo is a part of my practice that I have been at for many years. My mom took me to an actual séance many years before I knew this. It was at a Spiritualist Church that met in an upper room. I do not remember all the details of that night super well. But the one thing I remember like yesterday was when they split the people up. I had to sit with someone other than my mom. The facilitator then took us through a spiritual exercise to open our minds and spirits as we sat with a stranger. Then, we had to close our eyes and try to describe the person’s home.

I did that, down to the kind of carpet the guy had. He looked at me, part speechless, part scared to death! I remember the facilitator saying something to him about the power and purity of kids. I didn’t understand most of what was talked about, but I knew I had some ability to see. That was my very first experience of any of this.

When you enter certain Derived African Traditions, Spiritism is the primary way many spiritual houses help those in the house develop relationships with people’s ancestors and ancestral guides. Every single espiritista develops and grows differently and at different paces. It should never be a game or competition because we all (should) understand that we have different gifts and abilities with our spirits that are as unique in how they work as our fingerprints!

There’s this thing you start to experience, though, and that’s what my post is about today. When you are in misas (basically our equivalent of a séance), you begin to notice that one person will receive a message or see something, and then another person seems to pick up that message and see or hear more. This can go on for several minutes with one issue, where the mediums in the room all start to see with increasing clarity whatever the subject is for someone in the room. I call that the “chain of manifestation.” The chain sounds heavy and binding, but I do not intend that. I use chain because, since I have experienced it myself, it always feels like a swift, energetic connection to the initial person having the vision that grows like a rapidly blossoming flower.

What is also cool about it is those less developed mediums (usually because they are new) will begin to ride these same waves. The ability to ride the wave or receive nothing has very much to do with the degree to which you trust yourself. If you have a lot of self-doubt, if too many people along your path have made you feel like you’re worthless, it will be harder for you. More challenging but NOT impossible.

You see, the beauty of Spiritism in any form is that it is our birthright. Every human being has ancestors and ancestral guides, every one of us. We are born with them. We chose them before we came here from wherever we were. So even the oppressive words of others cannot snuff that divine light. My road toward development in this part of my practice was complex and challenging. I had toxic elders. I had people who flat-out taught me wrong stuff. I even had people tell me to throw certain ones of my spirits away.

But not one of them succeeded in stopping my development. They failed because my spirits were several steps ahead of all that drama. And I am not unique. I have heard this same thing from others. But it can take time to recognize the master plan that our spirits have. Sometimes, we will only know why they do something well after the fact. As I have often said, so many of us are eager to learn about fancy, exotic spirits from cultures we don’t even know when we have some of the most potent spirits we could ever imagine in our blood and bones. We are the ancestor altar.

I’m writing about this lesser-known part of espiritismo because it has also come my way that American Spiritualism (a related but different branch of Spiritism) is on the wane. Like other organized religious groups in America, it has struggled to remain relevant to the newer and younger generations. Sure, people like Theresa Caputo can sometimes get people’s attention. Still, some spiritualist friends have told me there is a rigidity in how the Old Guard holds to the tradition that makes it unattractive to the newer folx.

I find that ironic. It’s ironic to me because if you study the life and teachings of Allan Kardec, you can see that there was an experimental, pioneering aspect to what the Good Spirits did through him and those first spiritists. They received the message alright, but it is entirely different than translating that message into an easily reproduced practice. The very nature of Spiritism is to have a pioneering spirit and seek to convey the message of it for the present age. Spiritual phenomena like the “chain of manifestation” drive home this point to me and continually remind me that, as a medium, I am not in control. I am doing my best to open myself to Spirit so what needs to be said and done gets said and done. It is the spirits of the people gathered with me making that chain to come forth and guide us. I can see, however, that there is a tension between this movement of Spirit and pray that the tension becomes a creative one, propelling espiritismo in all its forms into the future while it honors its pioneering past.

A REVIEW OF AZARIEL FLAME’S “The Art Of Sigil Craft: Sigils, Servitors, And Hypersigils Master Class”

It is not very often that I have time to take another occultist’s classes, just because life gets hectic as a business owner and teacher. But I made the acquaintance of Mr. Flame and, after looking through his online shop, became quite curious about his class on chaos magic. I do not consider myself a strong chaos magician, mainly because I have not found a book or method that makes the practice work well for me.

That was until I took Azariel’s class! I was impressed by two things he does. One is that he packs much information in a little over three hours. And when I say large, I mean LARGE. As the namesake title suggests, we went over sigils, servitors, and hypersigils and the general conditions to use them. Unlike other things I read or studied, Azariel makes such your sigil crafting is deeply grounded. He does not give one way to do this (then it wouldn’t be chaos magic!). He instead offers examples and invites you to piece together what works for you. Perhaps the most novel is his teaching that a novena—usually a tool of Catholic devotional piety—can “power” a sigil or servitor. By making this distinction (something I have never seen anyone else do), he shows a clear path toward apprehending the power of sigils so they work for you without forcing you into a box you would rather not be in.

The second of many gifts the class gives is around how what he teaches about sigilcraft in chaos magic is something that can be its self-contained practice. In other words, you don’t have to be or study anything else. The practice he lays out is something a person can use to improve their life with the tools of chaos magic alone. I like this level of utility because not everyone is called to or feels comfortable practicing multiple traditions. Some people are also very focused, meaning they resonate with a specific way of working and stick to it, often with excellent results. I teach in this fashion, presenting Hoodoo systems as their own self-contained thing so people do not feel pressure to become something they don’t want to be.

This is a course where you cannot go wrong. Even if you have no interest in doing chaos magic, I encourage taking the course to learn a clear method of how it can be done. I think it’s always best to understand how different people do the same thing so that you can appreciate your personalized way even more. In the end, this is something Azariel accomplished.

So, if you are looking for a different purpose or perhaps a new direction, you can’t go wrong taking this course! I am still determining when Azariel will teach it next, but you can find the website to sign up here: https://mysticflame.myecomshop.com/product/sigils-servitors-and-hypersigils-class/.

Enjoy!  

REMINDER: WORKING THE SPIRIT 2 IS STILL ON AND POPPIN!

Hi Everyone!

I have been writing much more than usual, and wanted to lift up one more time my current flagship course, “Working the Spirit 2,” which is been going on for roughly a couple of weeks now.

I have spoken about this class a few times, but there has been a particular issue that’s come up that I wanted to address today. Many have reached out interested, but assumed they could not take Spirit 2 because it is an advanced class. None times out of ten, when I chat with people about their background, I find out that Hoodoo is not their first or only practice. That they have other things they have been doing for years.

This is a good thing as regards taking this class! The only reason I placed a prerequisite on it is because if a person has NO other practice, diving into advanced Hoodoo will be overwhelming. I myself felt that way a few times when I started doing Hoodoo years ago and tried to learn more advanced stuff from teachers who did not organize or teach well. People who DO have prior practices tend to have an easier time with the advanced material because the concepts of it more or less are parallel across traditions. There are rarely things so foreign from one practice to another that a person can’t get it.

Continuing along these lines, if you have some prior experience, you will be able not only take this class, but also absorb the material of the other two courses in this three-part series. I designed them so that they did not need to go in a specific order. The intro course is an intro simply because I wanted people to have the information in that course up front, especially if they are new to Hoodoo or magic period. Working the Roots gives that foundation that makes it easy to spring into other areas and focuses after.

So please, do not let the fact that you haven’t studied Hoodoo in depth keep you from learning it, or even starting your journey into it with Working the Spirit! You also have me as the instructor, and I will always do my best to alleviate confusion and cultivate and sustain a nurturing learning environment for us all.

There is still time to join the class, if you haven’t before. I would love to have you!

The link to the class is here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/working-the-spirit-the-advanced-art-of-rootwork-part-2/.

THURSDAY’S NEW CLASS ALERT: OUT OF THIN AIR

Hi Folx!

This course came about after I created my “Portable Wonders” class, where I began toying with connecting Hoodoo to the Elements. This class continues those thoughts, focusing exclusively on one element. We again return to the spirits of the 6/7 Books of Moses, which contain Aerial Spirits with specific abilities and ways in which they help the one who calls on them.

Also, like before, we begin by acquainting ourselves with them and learning how to conjure them. We always start such work by establishing a sorcerous relationship and pact, so they will come when called and assist us and others as needed. Yes, you heard right—you can connect with these spirits and broker assistance for people other than yourselves. That is some serious “replay value” right there!

Unlike some of my other spirit-based classes, I also discuss how to maintain the relationship with the spirits. Many people teaching spirit work do not give those keys to people, and the lack of that knowledge can make the difference between consistent results and repeated failures.

These spirits and this class work a lot with the Mind. People often reach out to me and ask how they can push someone to do something. Many do not understand that any coercion work is engaging in a war of your Mind with your target’s Mind. This magic is difficult, even with the spirits' assistance. So, it is best to have a strong practice behind what you do; this class goes a long way toward that. While the class does not go deep into this aspect, this Hoodoo Air Magic could be jailbroken to alleviate negative conditions or strengthen positive ones, such as creating a mojo hand for mental peace and strength, conjuring one of the Aerial Spirits to oversee this energy into someone’s life.

May this class be a breath of fresh air to your practice and give you more fantastic tools to influence the Mind! The link to the class is here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/out-of-thin-air/.

WEDNESDAY’S NEW CLASS ALERT: HOODOO CONGO FOOT TRACK MAGIC

Hi Beloveds!

Happy Hump Day! This new one-off course focuses on what some people call “dirt sorcery,” although the sorcery of it is in the specific context of Hoodoo. Whenever I think of Foot Track magic, I know this is one of the most substantial remnants of Congo African spirituality, which is still a part of Hoodoo. This is a place in the practice, both in Hoodoo and related ATRs, where dirt is understood to be a substantial energetic container for the energy or spirit of a place.

Dirts also serve myriad purposes! They can be a battery for working. They can be a way to deploy an aggressive boneyard spirit against an enemy. But as I teach here, they can ALSO be used to bring healing, light, and positivity to a negative situation. I have seen no one suggest this last possibility until now, and it is overdue. There is a focus on baneful workings from teachers and books sometimes that needs to be more balanced. Those who teach must show other ways of thinking, even if they deviate from the norm. In this class, you can taste the fruits of one way of doing this!

Finally, and I say this as a point for deeper reflection related to Congo spiritualities, dirt is generally symbolic of the universe itself. The dirt and other materia used to create items of power are understood to be a microcosm of how the universe functions. So, when doing this work, you are tapping into that power, too.

I hope this class strengthens your arsenal of tools to defend and fight for yourself and those around you who need the help. The link to the class is here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/hoodoocongo/.

TUESDAY’S NEW CLASS ALERT: SERVE AND PROTECT!

Hi Folx!

As promised, I am coming to you on Day 2 of this week to lift up another of my new one-off classes! I often create these one-off courses because, even though I have my flagship Hoodoo classes, they cover so much material that if I added anything else to is, I feel like people my get overwhelmed. One-offs make more sense to me to give practitioners a deep dive into a certain subject area. In this case, this one is all about protection.

Unlike some others I have made, this course draws from THREE different traditions I practice: Hoodoo, Powwow and Solomonic Magic. What’s so cool to me is all three of them are related and intertwine into each other in the way they work. Even the formal and sometimes-rigid Solomonic magic does its own version of rootwork through European folk practices weaved into some grimoires. So we are working in the spirit of that in this class.

The other key to this course is that we are working with some of the spirit arcana of the 6/7 Books of Moses. The strength of this one-off is the way the spirits and your built-up relationship with them will power your protective practice.

I also follow loosely elemental lines in the sense that we use the 5 elements to organize the practical workings you will learn. I don’t know too many other instructors who organize things this way with Hoodoo. It is not an absolute, but rather my attempt to show yet another way to think outside of the box and incorporate practical magical correspondences. Again, my goal is ever to teach people how to see the value and potential of what they already know with what they are learning. We should never have to reject and throw out everything we have learned before to become something new—unless we want to.

I hope this class brings the benefit of protection into your practice and for those you may serve. The link to the class is here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/serveandprotect/.

NEW CLASS ALERT: PORTABLE WONDERS!

Hi everyone!

So, I have an exciting week of new releases all at once. I have been working on FOUR new one-off classes for a while. All are locked and loaded at the Blackthorne School, but this week, I will drop a daily post highlighting each class and why it is vital to anyone’s practice. I am thinking about this, particularly for people trying to find a unique practice that fits and works for them. These posts are dedicated to everyone trying to find their way!

With that in mind, let’s begin! Our first Hoodoo Mini-Hack up this week is a fun class I have termed “Portable Wonders.” The primary purpose of this class is to equip you with the means of creating talismans and amulets that will provide protection and a host of other beneficial conditions for yourself or a client (yes, I assume some taking these courses will use them to build their own business, too). There are specific talismans and amulets taught, five of them to be exact, but that does not mean you are limited to those. The whole point of this class is to see the logic and approach behind taking materia, spirit conjuration and your intention and weave those things together to create an object of power.

As much as I work to keep things simple, sometimes we must dive into a specific practice more deeply to ensure it is anchored properly. Thus, this course has more ceremonial magic principles than one of my one-offs tends to have. But don’t let that dissuade you! You may also adjust this as you need.

Which brings me to my final point! I always assume folks learning Hoodoo likely have other occult practices they do. It is thus more than okay to look at this material and consider how you might jailbreak it. One talisman in here is the Triple Jack Hand, where I do just that. The original talisman the Triple Jack is inspired from has some ingredients that don’t make sense for our day. But I could look at that original working and easily discern what it was supposed to be about, then make changes based on my knowledge of Hoodoo correspondences. You all can do the same as well! Hoodoo is one of many traditions with correspondences, whether we are talking herbs, roots, religious symbols, or even spirits. So, the utility of this class is limited only by our imaginations!

I hope you enjoy it; may it bring blessings to you and those you might serve. The link to the class is here: https://www.theblackthorneschool.com/courses/portablewonders/.

WORKING THE SPIRIT: BEYOND THE REGISTER OF SPIRITS?

I enjoy doing Facebook Lives and interacting with folx who are both interested in my courses and want to have a little fun and shoot the breeze for an hour. The last one I had this past weekend was a good time for everyone. One question I was asked was, if someone is a practitioner with a devotion to another kind of spirit or deity outside of what I am teaching, is it okay for that person to incorporate Hoodoo into their work with that “outsider” spirit?

As I said then and say now, that is a FANTASTIC question. I immediately said yes and briefly explained, but upon further reflection, there was a qualifier or two I should have mentioned. My overall answer is still yes, however!

One essential qualification is that whoever the spirit is, it is best and appropriate to ask said spirit if it is okay to mix and incorporate Hoodoo into your practice with them. I tell this not to imply that syncretism is wrong in any way, but more that if it IS a spirit you have a strong relationship with, it is best to respect that relationship by asking about significant changes you are considering. I see it sort of like when two people are married. I knew an older couple that, when the man retired, he went and spent a massive chunk of his retirement money on a monster-sized pickup truck without consulting with his wife. He caused World War 3 in his house!

For me, it’s the same with spirits. I will not do arbitrary things in my relationship with a spirit unless it is a bonafide emergency, in which case I will do what I need to do and apologize later. But for standard everyday stuff, or just because I want to change something, I feel it is the right thing to do to ask.

Another qualification, especially when considering incorporating aspects of ATR/ADR traditions, is researching and ensuring what you plan to do aligns with the energies and nature of a spirit. Many of us can be guilty of this and jump head-first into the deep end of the pool when our swim technique is not ready for that. Horror stories also abound of people mixing spirits and their energies in rituals (sometimes in the same tradition even), only to have their lives turn upside down because they did not understand a historical or mythological contraindication.

So, what I am saying for real is to be careful. Hoodoo is a great crossroads practice. You can practice Hoodoo as its own discrete tradition, adding nothing of any other in it, and you can have a complete and fulfilling career of it. But just as many people, for a very long time, have been conflating Hoodoo with, for example, their “mother” religious traditions. Even Hoodoo itself, in its historical context, did some of this. The significant presence of Jewish and Solomonic magic is but one stark example of that. Enslaved people did not start Hoodoo with that knowledge because it was not a part of their tribal culture. It was later grafted into the tradition when the two ethnic worlds encountered each other and exchanged that cultural currency.

The thing that’s great about taking a class on Hoodoo is that it gives you the think tank to not only wonder about this question but experiment and report back to your student colleagues. A vibrancy comes from the check-ins; from my perspective, the material comes alive even more as students engage and reflect and engage more. Sometimes, I weigh in, while other times, I hang back and let the students lead their own discussions and debates. This, for me, is how a person’s practice becomes unique and effective for them. It is familiar, works with their strengths, and sustains a lifetime of practice. It doesn’t get much better than that!

WORKING THE SPIRIT: A BRANCH OF MY FOUNDATION

I often speak on these reflections of the parts of my practice that serve as crossroads, tying together the parts of who I am spiritually to make a coherent and consistent way of doing the Hoodoo I do. One of those is the practice of espiritismo, or what is known in English as Spiritism. Spiritism has its primary root in European spirituality, coming forth during a period where there seemed to be few options spiritually other than the overarching presence of Catholicism. Kardec, whose name is a pseudonym for Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, himself was a French Catholic. The period of his manifesting the practice of Spiritism occurred in the mid-19th century. For those unaware, that means this spiritual practice was developing during the period of American Slavery and global colonialism.

I cannot do Kardec’s life and work justice here, but suffice it to say that the Good Spirits, as we call them in Spiritism, made it known to him that he had been given the option of engaging in a divine mission of bringing a quasi-scientific method of spirit-work to the world. It was one he was promised would spread worldwide, which it eventually did (another post for another time!). Central to ALL forms of Spiritism is the foundational idea that our work with spirits is, first and foremost, to ennoble and elevate them. When we do this work, we elevate ourselves, for we are spirit. This elevation process is the chief means the Opposing Forces are thwarted. The manifestation of the Opposing Forces is both supernatural and within the machinations of the seen world. But when we earnestly do the work of Spiritism, it brings a Light to our world that the Darkness Without Light cannot undo.

How is this practice a crossroads piece of what I do, you ask? Well, because espiritismo is the most open of things I do. The tradition, especially its Caribbean variants, incorporates all kinds of spirits into each practitioner’s spiritual court: Congos and other Africans, Asian spirits, Roma spirits, angels, animal spirits, and much more. Racism and other isms make no sense to us, mainly because you are whoever you are from, wherever you are, but you can have spirit guides from anywhere and at any time. All the identity politics and power dynamics we use to control and oppress each other do not exist in that spirit world. So, practicing this spirituality gives you a perspective unlike what we see in our daily walk.

As I told someone dear to me recently, I also practice espiritismo because it reminds me that, as much as I work for and serve other people, I also need to uplift myself and the spirits who do so much of the heavy lifting with me. Yes, a spiritist may be trained to do practical magic at their Table, but we should always be setting time aside where we sit, meditate, pray, or sing. We need to connect and take in the Light to give us strength for the journey in a world that feels more broken by the day. That time sitting is not a passive thing either. There is a download occurring. A deepening and cementing of relationships. An impartation of knowledge and visions, much like the Prophet Joel’s words: “I will pour out my Spirit on all people; your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.”

This is the character of Spiritism. Its doctrines and praxis deeply inform my approach to spirit work and how I teach this in my courses. We get into some of this, as well, in the Working the Spirit class that starts Monday. My hope for all reading this is that your Good Spirits continue to guide you in the way you should go. As they do, I promise you will have some of the most extraordinary adventures you will ever know!