Book of Path -- Overview/Summary

Summary

Overview

I am an eclectic kitchenwitch. I believe that magick is the energy that connects all things, and that spell work is manipulation of this energy. I live my day-to-day life with magick as a practical part of my existence. Most of my magickal work is done in the kitchen, with everyday supplies and a little “push” of magick.

History

The history of my path in particular is brief; it is a living that that I am creating it as I go, but it has some basis in Celtic traditions.

Role of Clergy

There is no specified role of clergy for my path, albeit my goal is to become a priestess of my created path. I would like to be a minister who teaches others to find their path someday, and their path would not have to be the same as mine.

Organization of Groups

I am mostly a solitary witch, but I do work with groups when invited, and also with Summerland Grove for Sabbats.

Core Beliefs

All beings and all things are connected by an energy or life force that I call magick. Most magick comes from the earth and the things harvested from her. There is a “cosmic reciprocation” for anything you put out into the world, but not exactly the threefold law.

Standards of Conduct

Mostly the golden rule – if at possible, I try to treat others better than I expect to be treated. I believe that you have a choice in everything you do, that every act is a choice – conscious or unconscious – and I try to act accordingly.

Pantheon/ Deities

Primarily Luna and Gaia. No specific pantheon.

Holidays

I celebrate the eight sabbats, with accentuation on Mabon, Samhain, Yule and Ostara.

Ways of Worship

Moon cycles are taken into account for rituals. I do group rituals when there is a group that I trust and love enough to work with (and when I’m invited). I do daily “vespers”. I maintain an altar, and celebrate the sabbats in solitary ritual regardless of whether I complete a group ritual for them. I try to take time every day to thank the gods/goddesses for another day in this life.

Reading and other References

Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs, Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Wicca in the Kitchen, Witch in the Kitchen: Magical Cooking for All Seasons, Magical Household, Everyday Magic, Kitchenwitch’s Cookbook, Real Witch’s Kitchen

Book of Path -- Altar

Altar and Tools

If you utilize an altar, what does it look like? It is a dark wooden hexagonal table. I try to change it with the seasons, decoratively speaking, but some things always remain on it. Currently it has representations of the four directions and elements, a white ceramic statue representing the maiden goddess that sits in a silver sun as a ‘centerpiece’, and my wand.

What is it made of? Dark wood.

What is on it? Salt and rocks for north, incense for east, candle for south, shell and crystals for west, representation of the sun and moon at center and my copper wand.

What tools do you use regularly? Or would like to use regularly? I think that if I had the time and resources to spend my whole life, all day, seeking spiritual enlightenment, I would use more tools. But as it stands right now, I don’t use many tools regularly. Candles tend to appear in a lot of my solitary rituals as a focusing agent, and I wear a robe in formal group rituals. If a ritual calls for representation of a particular element, then I use it, but nothing set.

What is their significance? I believe in representing the five points of the pentacle on an altar (earth, air, fire, water, life energy).

What is their use? Tools are used for focusing and amplifying magickal energy. In large group settings, I believe they help to create the “drama” that is needed to focus the attention and raise the energy of a group with varying levels of experience.

If you don’t use tools, why not? Resources and time are the first obstacles to my regular use of tools. After that, I don’t think they are where the energy needs to be focused for basic rituals. I think they have their place in formal and important rituals, and are important to some people.

Book of Path -- Holidays and Rituals

Wheel of the Year

If you celebrate seasonal celebrations, what are their names? I tend to follow all 8 sabbats, though my personal focus tends to fall on Mabon, Samhain, Yule, and Ostara.

When do you celebrate them? On the day they happen, or a close before as possible. While I understand in the grand scheme of the universe that my gods probably won’t kill me for celebrating the holiday late, I find it disrespectful to do so. Therefore, if I celebrate a holiday with a group after-the-fact, I would do an individual celebration on or before the day.

How do you celebrate them? Honestly, it depends on a lot of factors from year to year: resources available, budget, people to be involved, my own personal energy level and health at the time. To me, the most important part of a spiritual celebration is acknowledgment (of the deities involved and the event itself) and living life as is appropriate for that time of year. Spending more time reflecting at Yuletide, for example, rather than trying to have a ritualfest, which seems more appropriate for Midsummer. I want very much for my reaction to an upcoming holy day never to be this: “Oh, shieza! Ostara is coming up and I don’t have anything planned. I’d better throw something together”. Pardon my language, but I think it is much worse to half-assedly show honor to a deity/season/being than it is to do nothing at all.

What is their significance? They signify a way for people to remain in tune with the rhythm of lady earth. And lastly, only half in jest: In the olden days, people lived by and on the land, and they needed something to celebrate….as we do now, and there could be far worse reasons for a party than the turning of the wheel.

Esbats

If you celebrate lunar holidays, how and when are they celebrated? I don’t do a lot of ritual at all anymore, outside of the group setting. I reached a point somewhere and began to feel ritual-saturated, and no longer enjoy ritual for the sake of ritual. That is something that I want to get back in touch with this summer and beyond. Therefore, I do not necessarily celebrate the phases of the moon, but I do consciously keep myself aware of her phases. I try to take a moment every day, and every night, to greet Lord Sun and Lady Luna. When I need/choose to do a spell or ritual, the lunar setting is a factor.

What is their significance? They reflect the ebb and flow of some of the energy in the world that connects all things. I think that both the sun and the moon hold power over my life, especially in connection to my mood and general welfare. I think that they have healing power to a level that is rarely found elsewhere.

Rites of Passage

Does your path recognize specific rites of passage? What is their significance? Yes, I think it is as important to celebrate rites of passage as it is to celebrate the seasonal holidays. Rites of passage are the seasons of a human’s life. While I do not get a chance to do these often, I think there are levels of rites of passage. There are the biggies (birth, death, marriage, puberty, and graduations), but there are others sometimes less acknowledged that I think can call for a ritualistic recognition, such as any big ‘first’ in a person’s life (first job, car, home, experience with sex).

If so, what are they and when are they celebrated? I have only been able to take part in two rites of passage, so far, and that would be my maidening and Ashley’s maidening. But I believe that the individual rite needs to be suited to the person it is for. I’ll have to return to this question after I have more experience with it.

Book of Path -- Ethics

Ethics

What ethics rule your behavior? I think that the more I read about ethics, the less easily definable that word becomes to me. I am ruled by my need to care for others, and my need to take care of myself (though more of the former). I am ruled by my need to teach others, and to eternally learn. I am ruled by the love I feel for everything, because I believe all things are connected and to not love everything would be like not loving a part of your own self. I am often ruled by what instinctively feels right when making my decisions. My biggest ‘ethical’ rule is that there is always a choice, and every thing -- every action, every word is a choice. I think a person’s mouth, and even actions, work before their brains sometimes which leads to unconscious choices, but they are choices nonetheless. I no longer believe in the ‘rule of three’ that I followed for so long; I feel it is too precise and exact for the movement of choices through the universe. I am ruled by the knowledge that there is a cosmic reciprocation, but it is not exactly a three-fold notion.

How do you treat others? I try really hard to follow the golden rule, and most of the time it comes naturally. But I like to be right and sometimes it’s hard to concede something to another person if it means my not being right. I truly feel that my place in this life is to teach, so I also sometimes treat others like my students. (This honesty thing sucks). I, in turn, am often willing to learn, but the role of teacher comes most easily to me.

How do you treat yourself? I have done a great deal more harm to myself than I have to anyone else. I knowingly went into an eating disorder when I was 16, despite my nursing family background, and that is something that I now must choose not to take part in every day. I’m getting better at putting myself first. By that, I mean leaving some work at work (mental work and grading), and making my wants and interests known to those I love, and trying not to apologize for my beliefs (religious and otherwise) when I have every right to have them.

How do you treat the world around you? Not as well as I should, environmentally speaking. But I feel all things are connected by magick (which I define as the energy in the world that connects all things and can be used for various needs and such), and I try to put out into the world what I would like given back to me – cosmic reciprocation. I believe in an ever-fluid balance in the world, and try to create more good energy than negative to push into that balance.

Book of Path -- Philosophy

Philosophy

What is your basic philosophy? I feel like the entire rest of the book of path should be answering this question all ready. Religious philosophy includes origins of the path, ethics, deity, ritual format/style, how I celebrate the holidays, how I set up and view community, and what varying symbols and designs mean to a me.

How do you see the world? The world is an interconnected and interactive ‘being’, for lack of a better term. All things ever created are connected and they all serve a purpose for being here, albeit some purposes are larger than others. I do believe that things, places and beings are created, but part of my brain/soul tells me that some things were here before the concept of ‘creating’ existed. This idea is too big for a human mind to truly grasp, in the same way a deity that is either non-humanesque or non-ball-of-energy is hard to grasp.

What is your role in this life (if any)? I am here to learn and to teach. The capacity in which I fulfill these roles has all ready changed several times, but my existence has always been about education. I do not just mean public high school education in English, but also life education and self education.

What is life? The time when beings and things consciously exist with the other beings and things on this plane.

What is death? The time when beings and things pass onto another plane. I believe that both life and death are temporary states. Reincarnation exists because when each being/soul is created, they are given a set list of things to do and are reborn again and again till they get them all done. Therefore and in my opinion, there is a final resting place or an un-creating.

Book of Path -- Deity and Beings

God and Goddesses

Who are your gods? Gaea, Persephone, and recently an as-yet-unidentified trickster god

What are they like? What do they want? Supporting, harsh, dedicated, helpful, demanding. They are everything, depending on their mood and time of year. I work with my goddesses on many levels. I am their ‘employee’, they are my friend and ‘boss’. They are guides, teachers, connective energy between all things. I mostly communicate with them through prayer (both formal and informal) and ritual, and they communicate back through adjustments and protection. I have actually spoken to Gaia some, as I have worked with her the longest. The speaking is most non-auditory (in my head).

Write down any myths that you know (or follow) about your gods. Persephone and Demeter (creating of seasons), Gaea created the world, the great kitchenwitch protects and teaches.

Otherworldly Beings

Besides Gods and Goddesses, who peoples your Otherworld? I promise this is not a cop-out answer, but I believe all types of beings/creatures are possible. Faeries, elementals, nature spirits, humans, animals, connective energy between all things. Everything is possible, and I refuse to deny the existence of something, unless I can clearly be proven wrong. I go a great deal on faith when it comes to the existence of magickal beings. I also believe that people and beings can communicate in an Otherworldly manner, namely through the astral planes.

Book of Path -- Creation Myth

The next several posts will be parts of my Book of Path, which is a simple working overview of of my particular path of paganism. This is not to be confused with a Book of Shadows which is usually a collection of rituals, spells and reflections that are kept private amongst members of a circle or coven.

For my minister training class I had to create, write and compile various aspects of my path including the following: creation myth, deity, philosophy, ethics, festivals, ritual, symbols, tools and organization.

As my path is that of a hearthwitch or kitchenwitch -- there are no existing creation myths and therefore I wrote my own:

Here it is:

Creation Myth: The Great Kitchenwitch in the Sky

The Great Mother stood alone in her great kitchen, debating what to make for dinner. She had a great dining hall, with an enormous (spanning many miles) table and innumerable numbers of chairs in all shapes, materials and sizes. She had the most beautiful dishes made of frozen starlight, and the best ingredients (the world, quite literally my dear) at her fingertips.

The Great Mother always ate very, very well.

What the Great Mother did not have, and what she really wanted, was a family to share her great food, beautiful dishes, and lonely dining hall with each night.

So, the Mother grabbed her largest skillet and set it on her stove (which was approximately the size of New York City). She reached out her window and grabbed a handful of the sun, a half measure of the ocean. She tossed in love, compassion, a pinch of argumentativeness to make things interesting. She mixed gently with a whisk made out of tail of a comet, tasted, and then added a dollop each of trust, joy, music, and curiosity. For her final ingredient, the Mother added a single tear of loneliness (her last for a long time), and then began to toss the mixture in its pan.

The mixture began to sizzle, so the Mother tossed with more exuberance, causing splatters to splash to the floor near her feet. But, compelled by a force outside of herself, she continued to toss the mixture up and down, catching as much as she could each time.

The Great Mother felt a tugging on her skirt, and looked down to see a tiny creature near her foot. It was no bigger than her little toe. The creature had two arms, ear, eyes, legs, just as she did. It hugged her foot and made a sound, the joyful notes of its laughter taking a full minute to reach the Mother’s ears.

Kneeling, and then stooping down, the Mother picked the creature up and brought it close to her eyes. “I shall call you woman,” she said to the tiny creature, “because you are much like me”.

Looking around, the Mother realized that there were hundreds of little creatures around her, of all different shapes and sizes. After whipping up a quick batch of moonbeam soup to feed her new friends, the Mother went about naming each and every creature before she would let herself rest.

The Great Mother and her friends lived a long while together, happily enjoying fantastic meals and good company. But after a while, the Mother grew tired of having company all the time. She decided to bake them a new home, which she made much like monkey bread, twisting and pulling the dough until it was the proper shape and size.

Placing the freshly cooled planet in a galaxy of appropriate beauty, the Mother delivered her creatures to their new home. Before she withdrew to take a long-needed nap, the Mother told her first creature, woman, this, “If you want to feel me close, you will find me in your kitchen”.

And that is why all good kitchen witches find the peace and magick that they do while cooking. Each time they bake a cookie or stir a soup in their skillet, they connect back to the Great Kitchen Witch in the Sky.