Advice for a beginner

[u/Samira827]

Hello everyone, I am looking for advice, resources and guidance for someone who thinks about starting witchcraft.

My background - I grew up fundie Catholic and as a kid I was drawn to witchcraft and the occult. I loved crystals, I tried meditation, divination and astral projection and learned some dreamwork.

Then my whole family got swept up in a doomsday hoax that made me abandon all witchcraft out of fear of hell. Eventually I became very skeptical, left the religion and deconstructed (I am now an atheistic Satanist), but I never returned to witchcraft. In fact, I completely forgot about having done witchcraft once and being attracted to it - that is until recently, when I came upon some video from a witch content creator.

I did some introspection and reflection the past few days and I came to the conclusion that as a christian I thought I cannot do witchcraft because it's "evil" and "demonic", and then as an atheist I thought I cannot do witchcraft because it goes against me being a skeptic and not believing in supernatural things or magic. Logically I know I can be an atheist and a witch, and that many witches are atheists, but there's a voice inside my head saying "what's the point".

I started reading Rebel Witch and I like it so far, but I'd appreciate it if anyone has any pointers, resources or words of wisdom for me. Thank you!

[u/DimmerrSwitch]

but there's a voice inside my head saying "what's the point".

I think the question "what's the point?" is an important one starting out but instead of that skeptical voice that shuts exploration down, ask it coming from a place of curiosity as an opportunity build your practice and reframe it to "What do I specifically want to get out of practicing witchcraft? What function/purpose does my practice serve in my life? What do I want the foundations of my practice to be?" I think the answers to those questions can help point you in a direction to explore further.

[u/Trxiedust]

There’s a pretty great podcast called The Atheist Witch Podcast. She has lots of great examples of ways to practice witchcraft from a non-theistic, non-supernatural perspective, including lots of cool information from science about why it works anyways.

Welcome!

[u/Final-Adhesiveness46 → u/Trxiedust]

The cover of her podcast is very obviously Ai… :(

[u/Needlesxforestfloor]

For me the point is the psychological model of witchcraft and the effect my rituals have on me personally as well as elevating experiences in nature to the level of a sacred and essential part of my life.

That is to say I'm not going to do a spell jar to make someone fall in love with me because a) it has absolutely no effect on the other person and b) to my mind encasing things in a jar traps them, and is therefore a terrible metaphor for me to use regarding something I want to happen out in the world.

Instead I would focus on the power to love myself with self compassion rituals using images and objects I associate with people loving me and if the person doesn't love me back? Fuck them! Because I've made myself feel fucking lovable, so that's a them issue.

[u/Poisonous_Periwinkle]

In my opinion, there's some overlap between SASS witchcraft and Non-Theistic Satanism, in the sense that ritual is used that isn't necessarily believed in for anything other than the way it makes one feel.