Being the Magic: Saying No to Magical Perfectionism

Looking at a white woman’s hazel eyes through her hands, held in front of the camera, blurred out, with string lights woven through her fingers. Image by Rhett Wesley @rhett__noonan

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about how seductive the story of magical “doing” is. You know, the idea that magic (or spirituality) is something you do, something you can buy, something with an end goal as opposed to a process, a way of approaching life. Go on witchtok or instagram for 5 minutes, and you’ll know what I’m talking about. No ones saying it, but boy are the doing it.

This fixation on “doing magic” strikes me as an expression of our cultures flight tactics combined with predatory capitalism (predatory capitalism is sorcery from oppressors that makes you believe the only way to have a healthy economy is prioritize the rights and well being of the hyper wealthy to punish the poor. Sound familiar?). Yeah, I know. Thats a lot of complicated words. I’ve also been thinking about gardening, painting my nails hot pink, and watching Marvel TV shows, so it’s not all so meta, I promise.

Our shared obsession with perfectionism, time efficiency, and production are cultural expressions of a trauma response. Most folks are familiar with the terms fight, flight, and freeze. Not as many are familiar with the fourth, fawn (think of animals lowering their bodies or showing their teeth to communicate submission), but these four responses are found across cultures and species.

They are normal, healthy responses to crisis, moments of intensity which could result in harm for an individual. Each response is appropriate for a specific set of circumstances. Knowing the proper response in the moment is part of your body’s wisdom.

However, over time, individuals can get stuck in one of these responses, generally due to sustained trauma. You need to fight, but you freeze. Or perhaps it’s a moment to fawn, but you fight. This is an expression of chronic PTSD (C-PTSD), which occurs in the individual psyche, but also on a collective level, in the collective psyche. And we have plenty of traumas to recover from collectively; Eco-cide, colonialism, enslavement, genocide, war, the destruction of community structures, the oppression of queers, folks of color, and femmes, the list goes on.

Whether you and your ancestors have been on the giving or receiving end of the violence (and most likely at some point it’s been both), we have all been born into a traumatized world, carrying our ancestors trauma both spiritually and physically. We are not separate. The oppression of one is the destruction of us all. We’ve got the PTSD to show for it, and it leaks into our magical practices.

Hyper consumption, perfectionism, and constant doingness are (often) expressions of the flight response. Flight can be literally running from a tiger, but in our world, where tigers are far and few between, it expresses as a compulsion to be the best, to succeed. Wanting to be the best can be an expression of fight. Wanting to please others standards is an expression of fawn. The list goes on. We fight, freeze, flight, fawn our way into magic by criticizing and shaming ourselves through false expectation of the ‘right’ way to do it.

I used to really beat myself up when I didn’t do some sort of elaborate ritual on full or new moons. Being on Instagram exacerbated this problem. I’d feel like I’d lost some great opportunity to prove myself, to get good with the Universe, to make my dreams come true, to escape my misery. To ‘be a good witch.’ This would turn into a viscous cycle of not feeling good enough, and finding magic harder to engage with, because my shame was so overwhelming.

No matter what trauma response your nervous system prefers, the system which oversees it all is the inner critic. An over developed critic is an expression of trauma, whether systemic or individual, ancestral or personal. The inner critics job is to keep you safe, and it generally does so by bullying you so you don’t take risks or change or grow.

It doesn’t have to be this way, kids.

Besides, I’ve found that beating myself up just isn’t conducive to anything the magical/spiritual path has taught me (at least the good stuff, if a spiritual practice confirms your supposed not-enoughness, run the other way!!), and you maybe have found the same.

From Buddhism I’ve learned that my core self’s highest expression is presence. Not being good, perfect, knowledgeable, pretty, successful, or capable. Just being with. Animism has taught me that sabbath days are every day, that God is in my cells and the flowers in my garden, as much as the stars. I don’t have to do anything, except honor my relations. Alchemy has taught me that the gold I seek is within me, made from all the worst of myself.

The radical truth that is always to be found when we peel back the illusions, is that we are all already exactly as we should be.

Self-criticism takes that knowledge away from us, pulling us back into the illusions spirituality and magic are primed to liberate us from.

Now, despite my well developed inner critic, you can’t study this stuff for decades without learning things that counteract everything it says.

For example, I learned from Druidry and Witchcraft that it’s better to set intentions in the 6 days following the new moon. The crescent moon is called the Druids moon, or the Witch’s moon. It is a time of great potential, and unlike the actual new moon, you don’t have to start at 0, at nothing. You start with a sliver of light. A seed. I failed high school math twice (I missed a LOT of school, #spoonie) and even I can do that math. You have 6 days every 30 days for setting intentions. Its plenty of time. There is no pressure. Learning things like this helped me to relax. It turned my inner critics alarms down.

Now, as I deepen my study of astrology, I discover that I often am already ‘doing’ whatever the cosmic quality of the time requests. As I slow down to witness my innate process, I see that it lines up naturally.

Clients get nervous sometimes about astrological transits (the planets influencing your birth chart) they are going through, wondering how to accept the invitation available. You already are doing this, I explain. Your life is already following this path. Be present with what arises. Honor your process, be it messy or simply, and it will usually be messy. Listen to your body, and try not to close your heart. Take care of yourself and pause when it’s too much. That is all which is required of you. It is so simple. It is the hardest thing you will ever do. It is enough. You are enough.

For example, I didn’t plan anything for the recent Taurus new moon eclipse, even though it fell directly on my ascendent and squared my natal sun (translation: it was personal). It was on a Saturday, a day I try to leave totally free for rest and sabbath. I woke and without thinking started caring for my plants, making body butter, bottling herbal tinctures, and doing things to care for myself I’d been putting off (all very Taurean activities). I didn’t even think about it. It was just right. And at some point, covered excessively with the body butter I was creating, I laughed. Of course, I’d put off these things. Of course, I was doing them today. The right moment was just waiting. Your body, mind and soul are innately linked to the natural processes of above and below. You can trust them. Learning to listen is your only task.

When I first started my official magical training, my teacher said that an experienced practitioner does not require the trappings of the profession. Crystals, outfits, drums, crane bags, wands, talismans, etc, none of them are necessary to achieve the results you want. That really struck me. So why do we use these objects, I wondered? 

Well, a lot of good reasons. For the beginner spiritual practitioner of any tradition, they function as focusing agents, and support. Back up. Plus, they help our bodies to become part of the experience, instead of getting forgotten or in the way. Candles, the breath, crystals, chants, spells, these are all focusing agents.

Magic is the merging of two things, focus and desire. Physical objects can help you focus your desire or desire to focus. I mean, meditation is more fun when you’re wearing cool robes, staring at an beautiful stone, right? Spells are more fun when you get to slather everything with oil and then light it on fire.

We use props to support us till we become comfortable trusting our guides, our true selves, our bodies. We use them till we know what it feels like when we are aligned, when power is coursing through us. We use the astrological charts to plan the timing, but eventually we just know the feeling. We know when the time is right. The chart just validates and specifies. The crystals are just another ally. The spell is just fun to say. Pleasure is important to magic.

But the trappings still have value as part of the performance of magic, which both practitioners, and the clients and students of practitioners benefit from.

Master Tarot reader and filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky (Jodo), writes in his book Psychomagic: The Transformative Power of Shamanic Psychotherapy, about the ancient ties between drama and healing, specifically in the context of animist and shamanic rituals. Theatre and stories, tap into the archetypal realms, where healing and wisdom comes from. Jodo rejects the notion that the theatrical side of healing work, its use of showmanship, delegitimizes the psychological benefits of these healings. He rejects the (super racist) idea that medicine peoples are charlatans. Instead, they are artists, channeling a psychodrama that brings healing, wholeness, and reconnection to Source, (whether their own or the universes, they are always the same), for recipients.

Druids are bards first. Curanderas are storytellers. Magic is an art form. Art making is magic. The trappings of magic help us to tell beautiful healing stories.

They are also fun. Beautiful. Tactile. They help you play and enjoy, bringing your imagination into relationship to the living world. I love my crystals and rattles. I love my alters. They bring me such joy.

What a gift.

I don’t need to set a circle of crystals to trap negative energy, but why not when it makes me feel powerful? I don’t need to sit in a circle of candles and chant ancient goddess names to benefit from their support and insight, but like…why the hell not, if I have the energy?

My concern though, and the purpose for this article, is that I often see the trappings of the magical process become the actual process for folks.

There is a risk, especially for new practitioners, for doingness to replace beingness.

I’ll be honest.

I never chant in crystal circles, cause that’s a shit ton of work!

As a disabled neurodivergent spoonie trying to make it in kyriarchy I have limited time and energy! I spend it doing what I love most. My rituals are as simple as possible.

And I love ritual. I mean, I perform rituals as a job! I do spells for money! If I don’t have the time and energy for elaborate rituals, how could someone working 30+ hours a week?

So my primary magical ritual is my life. It’s living. It’s my writing, painting, gardening, reading, breathing. Walking in the woods and talking to a tree. Working on my relationships. Journaling. Eating. Exercising. Listening to the wind. Washing my hair. Putting on lipstick. Healing myself from trauma. The minutiae of my existence.

True magical processes are encapsulated in our bodies, hearts, souls, and minds.

Magic is alchemy, and alchemy is the process of continually refining the self, removing what is false to reach what is truly you. It’s the process of coming into alignment with the highest self, what Jung called the Self (note the capital S).

Life itself is the stage. The drama. And your ordinary setting and objects are more than enough magic to propel you into remembering your wholeness.

I don’t mean to knock magical objects, pre-made rituals, or spellwork. Often we need to borrow the words of others till we have healed enough to trust our own words. But remember that spell from Chani Nicholas, Juliet Diaz, or the Witch of LA is no more powerful or effective than your own heartfelt words. 

Pre-made rituals and spells teach us protocol, respect, and teach us about sacred space. The thing about sacred space is you think you need to travel there, till one day you discover you are always in it. Your life IS ritual. You’re always responding to the magic of the stars, you are, in living truly, honestly, bravely, leaning into your innate alchemical process of transformation. The stars are responding to you just as deeply. Your life is the cosmos learning about itself.

Studying witchcraft taught me that I was already a witch. I’m a witch when I notice the moon, or the weather, or the light as it grows and fades. When I feel joy in sound, touch, or taste. When I make something and share it. When I make something and keep it secret. When I assume my life is meaningful. When I get angry or cry. When I screw it up. When I give up getting it right.

So don’t throw away your spell books, crystals or wands. What beautiful, helpful friends!

But maybe think twice when that voice says you need the newest book, crystal set, or magically imbued underwear. Because you don’t.

You can tell that voice which says you need it, or that your bad if you haven’t chanted naked beneath the full moon cause you were tired from work, “Thank you for trying to keep me safe! I appreciate it. But you aren’t in charge.” And then you can connect in with your higher self. No special magic is required. Just ask them to come in. And then ask, do I need this object?

You almost definitely don’t need it. But it may increase your joy or pleasure.

It may be the right vehicle for you to do some money magic, and honor your worth through extravagance. That’s different though, then purchasing something because it helps you avoid that voice which whispers you are a fake, a fraud, a nothing.

See? Even shopping can be part of your spiritual processes (yay!). But don’t mistake it FOR your spiritual process.

The rituals you pdo are a performance of what is happening in the cosmos that is you, the cosmos through you, as well as between the cosmos and you. But that process is happening no matter what.

A wand is a symbol and focusing agent for your power, and the power of the guides and energies you channel and work with. It is not, and never will be your power.

The crystals help focus and activate your healing powers. But you can heal without them.

It’s easy to get seduced into doingness, but your beingness is the only magic you need.

Journaling and recognizing where you are in your process can be just as magical as raising the winds with a chant from an old occult book (Though your witch auntie suggests skipping weather magic till you are super experienced).

Your body is the only tool you need. Listen to it.

Your hearts opening is the greatest power you have. Share your compassion and change the world.

Your minds focus can release you from suffering (or a lot of it anyway).

Wherever you are in your life is exactly where the universe needs you to be.

You ARE the magic.

Anything you DO is just addition.

Decorate and bedazzle your magical practice if you want. We love decorations!!! Paint the world in rainbows!!!

Remember you are your magical practice.

Bedazzle your damn self.

Just know, your simple being is enough magic for a lifetime.