Kindly, Kris from Little Witch Remedies answered a few of our questions about his unique style of witchcraft; Kris created the gorgeous Lady Marigold essence that is in our winter competition – see our homepage for how to enter.
How would you describe your practise as a hedgewitch?
Eclectic to say the least.
As a Witch, I believe that I must venerate, love and worship whole heartedly at the source of all things, the Goddess. My practice as a Witch has developed organically, through living an intuitively magickal life, following my own heart from early on, and learning the magick from the world around me. I have had few teachers in my life, and what I do is the product of the Goddess teaching me herself.
For me, the HedgeWitch is a being who has a cultivated dialogue and mutual exchange with the spirits of the forces in their terrain. Inherent in my practice of HedgeWitchery is the Animistic belief that everything has a soul or spirit, and one must learn to treat everything with respect, building relationships like one would with a new friend, in order to connect its energy.
For me specifically, this has meant developing connection with the plants, animals and other genus loci around where I live. Buy greeting them, appeasing them and connecting with them like long family friends, they have given me strong medicine, lessons, skills and power, but more importantly a magickal, spiritual family that I cherish above all else.
The next important aspect of my practice as a HedgeWitch, and probably the most defining, is how I have dialogue with Spirit. An aspect of my witches cosmology, is the presence of the Hedge (the veil, the divide, etc). This is the demarcating energy that separates the physical realm from the spiritual realms. As a HedgeWitch, I cross the Hedge, into the Spirit realm to communicate, meditate and work magick. This is where I have the most connection with Spirit, in the deep meditative trance that allows me to travel far and wide away from the physical. Things that have been performed in the Spirit realm do definitely flow into the physical when anchored, and I further work within the physical realm, but giving thanks, talking to and of course crafting potions, charms and brilliant magick.
Adaptation and Practicality, are the next two key aspects to my practice. What I do must be easily adaptable and flexible. I must be able to make magic with what I have around me at any given time, and I like to think of it as being like MacGyver in my practice. Furthermore what I do must be practical. I hit things from every possible angle on every possible realm, to really make things manifest in the physical. My practice has to be real world applicable, and so it must be practically sound in its application and results. For example, chanting and burning incense alone isn’t going to heal me of my eczema. I must work on all levels, in all the bodies to change the outcome of the holistic system.
Building upon these foundation aspects, my practice as a HedgeWitch includes the use of plants for both medicine and magick, energy manipulation for healing, spell work and manifestion, various forms of divination (though I firmly believe we make our own fate), and just a dash of Fae-touched magick.
What drew you to witchcraft as a spiritual path?
I very much like the saying; “Once a Witch, always a Witch”
I guess I’ve always been on this path. From early on, I have always looked at the world around me differently to my fellow peers, and their way always just seemed slightly hollow and odd.
I was brought up in a heavily strict Christian household and schooling system, but kept my way of seeing the world most private until I was a legal adult, and able to act as I saw fit. This taught me the art of being authentic and true to myself, and glamouring the rest to avoid harm.
The first real glimmer of my power as a Witch is thanks to my brother, a truly great man, who taught me (even though I didn’t know it was magick training till I was a lot older) to control my own energy/thought and shape it into what ever I wanted to come true. The two of us were terribly wonderful little magick users, and we worked magick at two different angles. I don’t really like the terms that some up the Magician and Witch divide, “High” and “Low” magick. I prefer to use “Clean” and “Dirty” magick. Where my brother practiced “clean magick” working with thought forms, crystals and sheer precise energy manipulation of the aether, I liked to anchor aetheric shaping in the real world by getting my hands “Dirty”.
During the last year of my Tertiary studies, was a difficult time for me privately, and I began to think about my practice and what it was that I really thought of myself as. I asked for help from the divine to understand, and message after message came to me, until I could deny it no further.
I feel as though the path I walk is one I’m simply re-remembering, and not one that I have really chosen, but one that chose me.
Do you have any advice for younger people who are new to the craft?
Be true to yourself first and foremost.
You are your own compass and your own power. Deep down, in the inner most parts of yourself there is the voice and light that guides you in the right direction everytime, gives you the best advice everytime and tells you the truth, even when the rest of yourself lies a little bit.
Learn lots, and have lots of experiences.
Do lots of stuff.
The best way, and really the only way that things have stuck for me, is to do lots of things in my life. I’ve worked many different jobs, gone to tonnes of courses and workshops (a lot of them not craft related), read lots, took things apart, put them back together wrongly, took them apart again, made messes, learned to clean them up, and overall just got my hands dirty. Making mess has taught me lessons, and in these lessons I have learnt so much power. I’m still making mess and getting my hands dirty, and still learning lessons.
Laugh and have fun.
Laugh heartedly and often. One of the biggest lessons the Goddess taught me was to laugh at myself, and in almost any other situation. For me there will always be a trickster energy to what I do, and laughing is just part of it. It lightens the dark, darkens the light and generally brings things into a healthy balanced realism. Magick should be empowering and it should be fun. There is enough seriousness and rigidity in the world, and for me bringing that clogging stuffiness into my practice, just seems to dull the brilliant rainbow tapestry that is my practice. So I endeavour to have fun in what I do, and make my practice a joyous celebration of the Goddess in her many forms.
Tell us about your Lady Marigold essence, how did you prepare this magickal product & what can the lucky winner of our Winter competition January 2014 use the essence for?
The Lady Marigold flower essence, was made on Midsummer in 2013.
A few days prior, I spoke to a patch of wild marigold flowers from both sides of the hedge, asking for the Spirit of marigold to help me in crafting this potion. She agreed to being part of it most enthusiastically, and I set about gratefully picking flowers for the potion. On midsummer, during the day, fresh marigold heads were left to infuse in spring water in direct sunlight surrounded by wild growing marigold. This infused water was decanted and then during the full moon evening, dried marigold petals where infused into it surrounded by handcrafted tealight candles, placed to match the positions of the flowers it had been surrounded by during the day. During this evening process, I crossed the hedge and danced with Lady Marigold, bringing her energy into the potion, in sparkly golden yellow and orange radiance. Once the potion had it’s double alpha and omega infusion, it was sealed and anchored with a marigold brandy tincture.
For me Lady Marigold, is the twirling, giggling, laughing, gypsy, flamenco dancer of the caravans. She wears many layered skirts of sunshiny gold, orange and yellow, with bright jingly bells and chimes. Her demeanour is that of your world wise, bright and optimistic, and maybe a little wayward, aunt, who caringly listens to you given warm and uplifting truthful counsel. When things are down, she gets you to stand up, dance, laugh and bask in your own bright radiance and joy.
The Lady Marigold essence helps to heal wounds and tears in the subtle fields, enhancing warmth, regeneration and nurturance. It has an energising and uplifting brightness, especially in the solar plexus and sacral regions, which helps those to radiate life force. Furthermore it has a stimulating and balancing effect on the sacral and solar plexus chakras. She enhances communication and receptive understanding.
A few drops taken in water, or under the tongue, or on the pulse points, or even just keep the bottle near, is enough to tap into her power. |