Lucy Cavendish on creating a magickal life

How silence and close friendship can help cultivate the magic of your own mind.



Some people are still a little frightened of witchcraft and magic. The whole message of it being the oldest Western spiritual tradition still hasn't reached some people, and a friend recently looked at me wide-eyed when I mentioned a Witch friend and said, "How do you know witches?" Lucy Cavendish is one of the world's best-known practitioners of modern magick and witchcraft, and I have followed her work since I first started using her brilliant Oracle Tarot many years ago. Recently I have been absorbed in her fantastic new book Spellbound: The Secret Grimoire of Lucy Cavendish, and I have been so impressed by its fun approach to cultivating a unique spiritual path and its refreshing emphasis on self-empowerment. The book provides a practical framework for people (particularly young people) to intentionally create a better life which includes:



1. Becoming aware of your thoughts.

2. Raising the quality of your energy - particularly through spellcasting and magical ritual.

3. Building a magickal altar.

4. Dressing in an intentional way that inspires thoughtfulness and ritual (Magickal Dressing).

5. Becoming aware of the past - educating yourself in the history of witchcraft, Druidry and magic and situating yourself firmly within that tradition.

6. Learning the importance and meaning of amulets and symbols - detecting a tendency here? Lucy is cleverly using her book to encourage people to take in interest in history and culture - always an enriching and enlightening thing to do.

7. The use of spells - an essential part of any magick, and so much fun.

8. Being forgiving and helpful towards other.

9. Working with deities - again, a fun and highly engaging way to learn about history and mythology.

10. Empowering your intuition - learning to be in touch with your feelings and learning to honour them.







Spellbound is an enchanting practical guide to meditation, self-development and many other things employing Lucy Cavendish's own spiritual path of Magick. It is a book that will have an enormous appeal to young women, in particular, and I wouldn't hesitate to give it to anyone wanting to know more about Witchcraft, Wicca and Magick. It is an excellent introduction to the Western Mystery Traditions, and proves just how useful and applicable they are to 21st Century life. Its emphasis on practical ritual makes it enormous fun.







As we would expect, the book is filled with all kinds of spells, all of them look like tremendous fun, and the kind of conscious activity that helps concentrate the mind and also dissipate some of the anxious energy that cause them to be created in the first places. As the very wise Witch Lucy Cavendish reminds us:



"Spells also work on a psychological level. What this means is that they give us the means and confidence to take steps to protect ourselves. Thus, our energy shifts..."







Cavendish writes in her first chapter:



"There is an immense natural power in the universe which you are a part of.



You were born with this natural power.



What our modern world has done is harness these natural powers in many ways - electricity, solar power, digital technology - but there is a deep, deep force that has not been harnessed, which cannot be controlled, which flows through all of us.



Why don't you feel this force?



Because most modern humans are completely disconnected from their own power."



Lucy Cavendish


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