bugsopolis

[bugsopolis]

What goes too long unchanged destroys itself. The forest is forever because it dies and dies and so lives.

—Tales From Earthsea: Dragonfly, by Ursula Le Guin

[bugsopolis]

[bugsopolis]

coincidences are magical. they tell you that you are in the right place.

#witchcraft #magic #i got a new job recently and have been noticing many coincidences happening throughout the day #small things but they tell me that i made the right decision

[bugsopolis]

Art by Hoshi-Pan

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Celestial

[bugsopolis]

out of everything, what gave you away was how you said i'm trying. two small words. such bitter, hopeless agony.

#recently

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My dad has a massive vegetable garden and it is his life. Whenever I ask how things are going, he tells me about the garden. Periodically he will text me a picture of the things he's harvested and ask when I'm coming to pick them up. And for a while, the biggest bit of garden gossip has been his nemesis, the gopher. This gopher was consistently ruining his day by pilfering the best of everything just before my dad could harvest it. Anytime I talked to him, all he had to tell me about was "that damned gopher." He dreamt about killing the gopher, his truest enemy. He tried to train the dog to hunt the gopher, but the dog is a pacifist. He led some of the barn cats to the holes, but the barn cats have unionized and refused his offered rate. He then laid no-kill traps (can't risk having poison near the crops) with eventual gophercide in mind, but then suddenly he was faced with a cute and terrified animal and didn't have the heart. He released it. "He was so scared, he'll never come back." The gopher was back the next day, with a vengeance. That was some weeks ago. Today, my dad sent me pictures of his garden, and I saw a squash gently laid by the gopher's hole, like a package left on the doorstep. I said "Dad, what's that squash doing there by the gopher hole?" He said "Oh, he likes squash best." In an effort to appease the gopher, my father now gives him a little squash everyday, like leaving an offering for a garden spirit. This apparently works well as a compromise; the gopher has stopped stealing, content to have his meals delivered to his door.

#symbiosis

[bugsopolis]

Vintage autumn looks from Sororité Vintage

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dark academia is when you have to read the crustiest pdf known to man

[bugsopolis]

花曇り（hazy weather in spring）

Apr.12,2020 watercolor size：242*333mm (F4) paper：water ford white (細目・300g/m2)

[bugsopolis]

Getting Started: The Seven Laws of Magic

Magic is an inherently mysterious thing but there is a strange logic to its nature. Describing said nature is a difficult thing. How does one describe something that can never truly be known?

The answer for most of history? poorly. Practitioners of the arcane arts are not known for straightforward explanations. I will do my best to explain the basic mechanics:

The Law of Contagion: Once together, always together. The part of the thing is the whole of the thing. By performing magic on a strand of your hair, one can effect your entire body. The more intimate the connection, the more powerful the effect. A cigarette butt you smoked will have almost no effect, but a phial of your blood will be extremely effective. Magic using this law is known as Thaumaturgy.

The Law of Sympathy: Like attracts like. The image is the thing. A drawing or representation of something can gain its properties. A photo or drawing of you will have a similar thaumaturgical connection to you. Combining sympathy and contagion is the basis for poppet magic.

The Law of Correspondence: As Above, So Below. The gods are like us and we are like them. When viewed closely, atoms resemble solar systems. The big effects the small. The idea that there is a sort of harmony between similar patterns no matter their size. This is the basis behind astrological magic.

The Law of Resistance: Some things are more magically conductive than other things. Everything exists on a spectrum of “magical“ to “mundane“ and the less magic something is, the harder it is to effect with magic. The same extends to people who, for whatever the reason, simply have a harder time being interacting with magic. 

The Law of Balance: Magic seeks equilibrium, and therefore, every magical action has a cost. No magical act takes place without some sort of power behind it. Energy will not move unless something is moving it, be it a practitioner or the natural energy of the moon. A body in motion will stay in motion, a body at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force.

The Law of Reciprocity: If you don’t know where its pointed, its pointed at you. If it doesn’t have enough energy, it will get get energy from you. The process of getting hit with your own improperly constructed spell is known as Recoil. Safe practice often involves setting up wards to act as a barrier between you and any mistakes.

The Law of Reversal: That which is done by magic can be undone by magic. For every spell there is a counterspell, for every ritual a counterritual. Every ward can be hexed, every curse can be dispelled. This does not mean countermeasure will be easy or efficient.

[bugsopolis]

Looking To Join Your Local Antifa?

Over the last 24 hours, we’ve received no fewer than a dozen requests for contact information for local antifa groups all over Europe and the U.S.  THIS IS FANTASTIC! If you’re one of the people who wants to hook up with your local antifa, here are some things to know: 1)  We aren’t in contact with every antifa crew in the world (yet!).   In a lot of ways, antifa are more organized than ever before and we’re seeing cross-border collaboration with projects like this tumblr, The International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund, the International Day of Solidarity with Anti-Fascist Prisoners, etc.  So while we are building towards the day when we’ll know every antifa crew everywhere, we might not know of an active one in your area. 2) Referring you to a local antifa crew does not = endorsing or vouching for that crew.   Due to things like linguistic barriers, geographic distance, etc. we might have heard of an antifa crew near you that we can put you in touch with, but that doesn’t mean we necessarily know much more about them beyond some contact info.  So if we pass on a contact point for an antifa crew, please understand we aren’t endorsing them per se.  You should approach contact with any antifa or political group you don’t know personally with some common-sense security precautions, just in case.  Common-sense security precautions like these ones.   3) There might be active antifa networks where you are right now. If you’re in the U.S. you should check with The Torch Antifa Network; If you’re in the UK you should check with The Antifascist Network; If you’re in France you should check with La Horde; If you’re in Sweden you should check with Antifascistisk Aktion Sweden; If you’re in The Netherlands you should check with Anti-Fascistische Actie You could also check out other networks that aren’t solely antifa but who do antifa stuff, like the IWW.  4) You can probably find the nearest antifa crew yourself w/ some creative & skillful Googling.   Have you typed in the name of your town/area/region + terms like “antifa,” “antifascist,” or “antiracist?”  You might be pleasantly surprised by what comes up! 5) If you’ve done all that and can’t find a local antifa crew to connect with, it might be time to start your own.   We’ve written some tips about starting an antifa crew + some thoughts on what kind of things your new crew could be doing.  The Anti-Fascist Network has also published a guide to setting up an antifa group as well as a list of useful resources for antifa.  Finally, here’s our list of 30 antifa actions that pretty much anyone could pull off with the help of a few friends.  If you’re seeking out like-minded antifa near you, we hope this proves a useful resource.  We can’t wait to hear what you get up to in your part of the world!

[bugsopolis]

any book recommendations?

Yes! Books I’ve just read this summer and really recommend:

- Mexican Gothic (spooky!! Beautiful!)

- the house in the cerulean sea (I think @penpanoply recc’d this to me and it was gorgeous)

- a song below water - black sirens!!! Amazing mythos!

- the night swim (kind of true crime but not)

- the majesties (I really enjoyed! Family murder crime drama)

- caste: the origins of our miscontent—nonfiction but so fucking interesting!

- the glass hotel— Emily St. John Mandel books are hard to describe but they’re always great

- Hamnet — about Shakespeare’s son, but fiction.

-

[bugsopolis]

Liminality and the Power of Thresholds

Greetings, everyone. This article focuses on the concept of liminality, and I’m tagging it as part of my beginning witchcraft series. I will try my best to make this beginner-friendly by defining my terms and explaining as well as possible, though the concepts themselves are something many of us struggle to wrap our heads around. You can make yourself downright dizzy thinking about this overmuch! Nevertheless, the issue of liminality is important in many types of witchcraft, and has been instrumental in my own Craft, thus I really think many beginners can benefit from developing an understanding of it. So, what’s liminality? What’s “the power of thresholds?”

The term “liminality” is primarily used in anthropology to denote the middle stage of an initiatory ritual, wherein the individual undergoing it (the candidate) has transcended his or her previous status, but has yet to reach the point where they’re considered fully initiated. In other words, the term refers to an in-between state, and that’s exactly how I’m using the word here, except in a much broader context than just a ritual. While it’s true that, for example, someone undergoing an initiation into a coven will likely find themselves in a liminal state, liminal states arise organically, too, independent of whatever plans we humans might have. They can be physical, mental, or temporal, and all that is required is that the individual is passing from one state to the next, and that the experience is somehow meaningful or can be imbued with meaning.

Witches and magicians have, for thousands of years, known that liminal states make magical extremely powerful and tend to amplify any working that occurs within them. Why, one might ask? There are various theories. If you subscribe to an “energy” hypothesis regarding magick, you might see liminal states as extreme confluences of this “energy,” which is then harnessed for the magick. One might also conjecture that the individual, existing momentarily between states, is put into a position where literally anything seems possible, and thus the psychic censor or other mechanism that usually prevents the manifestation of thoughts is bypassed. Either way, you’ll likely find that, for whatever reason, liminal states can be helpful in magick.

I made the above image some time ago, and is describes some instances of liminality you’re likely to encounter in your daily life. It would be really easy if we could just make a list of all liminal situations and places, and just use that to time and plan out our magick, but it doesn’t really work like that. The truth is (and this is extremely important) liminal states are a human condition and only really exist in the mind of the witch. There’s nothing inherently magical about, say, a crossroads. Rather, a visit to the crossroads affects a witch’s consciousness to put him or her in a liminal state, and it is from the witch’s interaction with his or her environment that liminality arises. This is important to remember because, while the places I’ve mentioned in the above image are liminal for most people, everyone is different, and not everyone is going to have the same experience of liminality.

As an example, for someone with about average experience traveling, airports are highly liminal places for me, but someone who travels daily for work or whatever reason might find them much less so. Liminality is chiefly a state of mind, not a physical situation, though physical situations will often presage it. It could even be simply considered a feeling, albeit one rarely discussed. Ask yourself if you’ve ever felt utterly energetic, as if anything were possible, while at the same time, a little uneasy? That’s what liminality feel like to me. Whenever you have the distinct sensation of being between two states, you’re liminal. I should take this moment to clarify, as well: unease and a sense of risk is part and parcel with liminality. If you feel entirely safe and secure, you’re probably not experiencing a liminal state. Liminality always contains a layer of risk. It can be a controlled risk, or (usually) a non-physical risk that exists only in your mind, but the sense of risk is there.

Liminal Places

As I alluded to above, a liminal state can be induced by physical phenomena, manmade or otherwise, in the world around you. The classic liminal space oft-visited by witches throughout history was the crossroads - anywhere two or more roads meet. The liminal nature of such a state is apparent even to a casual observer. Even if you know where you’re going, when you reach an area where roads converge, you are left with a choice - which direction will you go? Thus, as you pass through the crossroads, you may well enter a liminal state, between existing on one path, and finding yourself on another. It does make for powerful magick, and this was known even in ancient times. Hecate, the Greek goddess of the three-way crossroads, was also assigned rulership to magick in general, and Hermes, a god with a similar purview, was also associated with the crossroads. Of the crossroads, Judika Illes writes,

“Magically speaking a crossroads is the place where multiple forces converge, where anything can happen, where transformations may occur. Energy is liberated and expanded at the crossroads. Instead of hopping over boundaries, you can stand in the center and be inundated by power, potential, and choices.”

Illes, Judika. The Element Encyclopedia of 1000 Spells: A Concise Reference Book for the Magical Arts (Kindle Locations 1648-1650). HarperCollins Publishers. Kindle Edition.

Illes also notes that the most accessible modern crossroads tend to be traffic intersections, though, thus they might not be the best place for magick these days. You wouldn’t want to cause a traffic incident, after all. Also, with roads and intersections as ubiquitous as they are today, and traveling short distances so common, without a doubt some of the symbolism of the crossroads has waned. Though you can still draw power from a place where two major roads converge, other liminal spaces exist in the modern world, with arguably more potent symbolism, though often without the historical precedent for their usage.

As I mentioned in the introduction to this article, airports, particularly the part of them off-limits to all but travelers, can be highly liminal places. The sheer amount of travelers passing through, many of whom likely find the territory unfamiliar, make this space highly liminal in most people’s experience. As I noted before, though, those who travel regularly or airport workers might not find such a space liminal, but most people, I’d wager, will. By far the most such liminal space I’ve ever visited was Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, France at dusk. 

I obviously cannot recommend running around an airport behind security if you’re not authorized to be there, but if you find yourself in such a place and feel that strange sensation of liminality, magick might be in order. You, of course, wouldn’t want to start compiling a charm bottle in an airport lounge or casting a circle, but as I hope everyone is aware, magick needn’t involve tools or overt actions, and a well-placed visualization or traced sigil can be extremely powerful if you’re in such a state.

Liminal places needn’t be the creations of humans, though. Ancient peoples considered various naturally-occurring places to be sacred, and a good bit of this probably stemmed from the place’s liminal quality. In particular, running water, as in a shallow stream or small river, can be highly liminal, and this is why many witches will work spells with water gathered from such a place, or, better yet, step into the stream themselves to perform a working. The liminality of swift water, for me, stems from the water’s rapid motion from one place to the next, flowing from one body of water to another, and ultimately to the sea. The water cycle that you’ve likely studied in school, where water evaporates, becomes rain, and returns to earth and ultimately the ocean, is an extended exercise in liminality. 

This may be why so many supposedly spooky occurrences are associated with thunderstorms, and is one reason collecting rainwater can be useful, if one is able to do so. Other naturally-occurring liminal spaces include where two types of landscape meet, the edges of hills, forests and mounts, and, of course, the shores of large bodies of water. In a strange, roundabout fashion, areas that humans frequently transverse, but don’t live in or dwell, can also be considered liminal. These include deep deserts, thick forests, and other places we humans pass through but don’t call home. This may be part of the reason spirits are so often said to live in such areas. I suspect it might be because humans who travel through them are themselves in a liminal state, and thus more primed to experience such things.

Times of Threshold

Liminal periods exist in time, as well. Most of us, regardless of our own religion, are likely aware that many faiths time their festivals and holy days around astronomical phenomena and the changing seasons. Wiccans and various other religious witches, especially, often find great significance in the equinoxes and solstices. These days are significant on many levels. For ancient peoples, they were discerned by reading the stars, length of day, and other events and helped to schedule planting and preparations for upcoming seasons.

The very fact that such observances marked a noted change in the activity of ancient and (some) modern peoples adds to their liminal quality. Really, though, the meaning goes deeper. Insofar as each solstice or equinox marked a significant alteration in the seasons and the beginning of a new period in the yearly cycle, they’re positively dripping with liminality. Many secular witches (such as myself) might interpret such holidays as wholly religious and see no reason to observe them as part of their practice. I, however, always feel that, while the days may not be tied to a religious mythos for me, the liminal force and significance of them on many levels makes for excellent magick, so I’ll often perform practical and pressing spells on such days, if at all possible.

Within the average week, as well, liminal periods exist - namely the weekends. While not everyone is going to have the sort of job that allows for the weekend off (I personally have rarely been in that situation), the cultural association of the weekends as a time “between” weeks is a very real thing. As such, weekends are a slightly (in my opinion, very slightly) liminal period for some people. This can depend on where you live, work, and what sort of experiences you have on weekends. I’ve never really managed to utilize the liminal quality of weekends extensively in my practice, but I do acknowledge it’s there. It’s also worth noting that banking holidays and other days when routines are disrupted/changed can have a similar quality for some of us, again, depending on our situations.

Within a single day, as well, liminal periods exist. As you might expect, these tend to coincide most strongly with dawn and dusk, when the sun is rising or setting. The comparatively rapid and highly visible transition from daylight to night and vice versa is quite liminal. Lesser (in my opinion), but still useful moments of liminality include true midnight (as in, the middle part of the night, not necessarily midnight on a clock, depending on where you live and time of year) as well as true noon (the same idea, but daytime). I consider these lesser in their liminal quality than dawn and dusk because the changes they represent are less physically represented and visible to humans, thus not as effective. Experiment, though - some are bound to find their experiences differ from mine, and these times have been useful to many occultists throughout history.

Personal Liminality

I have discussed thus far examples of liminality that are fairly universal and likely to be experienced by most, if not all, individuals. I now want to draw attention to those times of liminality that are either wholly personal to a single individual, or likely to affect only a small group. When speaking of individuals, naturally, one can imagine that birthdays, especially those that are considered significant in our society (the eighteenth in America, for example) are highly liminal times. If you practice astrology or study it, you might also be aware of certain major life events played out in the heavens that might induce liminality. 

An example of this would be the infamous concept of the Saturn Return, where Saturn cycles back into the same position it was in at the time of birth. This usually happens in an individual’s late twenties, then at long-ish intervals thereafter. I experienced my first Saturn Return in Autumn of 2015, and while I do understand those authors who consider it a liminal time, I personally didn’t find it conducive to magick as it rather disturbingly brought out a lot of issues in me concerning what Saturn represents. Still, everyone’s different, and if you study astrology, you’ll likely discover certain times that work well for you magically.

Liminal times likely to be experienced as a group include things like graduations, the first day of a new school year, final exams, and other milestones in daily existence that get shared by several people. If you’ve formal schooling at any level, you likely can think of a million examples of this, as school experiences are rife with rites of passage and transitions. As a college student many, many years ago, I would actively time some of my workings to coincide with things like the beginning of final exams or (even better) everyone returning to school after summer break, and I found these to be extremely potent liminal experiences. These occur less frequently, but still somewhat often, in the average workplace, and, as you might expect, certain workplaces are liminal in and of themselves (see above, about airports, etc.) I found, working in a diner for a while, that night shift was an incredibly liminal time and while I personally acclimatized to it, most of the customers were in sort of liminal states (tired from driving or partying, etc.,) thus providing the environment with a slight charge.

Living in a Liminal World

This will verge into unverifiable theorizing, but I honestly believe liminal periods are experienced occasionally by the entire world (or just certain countries), and that this has a massive effect both on magicians and witches working under such circumstances and average folks living through them. Unfortunately, though, liminal states on a very large scale tend to not be as pleasant for individuals as smaller liminal activity would, and can often be downright difficult or horrendous.

I consider, for example, World War II to have put the world in a highly liminal state for several years, but I think we can agree that, having the choice, we wouldn’t want to experience such a thing, regardless of any magical possibilities inherent in it. The question of what makes a large-scale liminal event is a bit hard to explain, but I honestly think it goes along with periods of time where decisions are made, and where humanity reaches a fork in the road. We reached one of those during World War II, and many times before and since.

This will sound way more woo-ish than my usual writing, but I must admit I believe 2016 and a bit of time proceeding it to be a highly liminal period, as well. There are various reasons for this, among them being the extremely contentious election in the United States, the escalation of climate change, and many other factors, but I believe we’re seeing a good portion of humanity plunged into liminality as we speak. Does this mean we can harness the force of it for positive and effective magicks? Possibly, but this is, of course, highly speculative. Certainly interest in the occult has risen exponentially recently, which may be related.

Conclusion

I hope this article was helpful and provides a useful framework for understanding the concept of liminality in magick, and gives you a head start on planning for magick in times and places of liminal power. Realize that none of it’s absolutely going to be true for everyone, though, and you’ll need to experiment and search yourself a bit to discover what liminality means to you, and how you might tap into it at will. Happy magick-making, everyone. Stay safe and have a good evening. If you enjoy my work, consider donating or purchasing a reading from me to help fund future endeavors. And, of course, if you’ve any question on this or any other topic that you’d like me to answer, don’t hesitate to send me an ask, but do please read the FAQ first.

[bugsopolis]

me: :(

the moon: 🌙

me: :)

[bugsopolis]

its silly that we have BLM carrds going around, everyone was reblogging them months ago on the regular & u guys are still asking “what are we supposed to do if voting biden is bad” or whatever. like the answer was in those carrds, several of them provided books & pdfs, most of them were FREE for you to read. & you STILL didn’t do your homework.

stop reblogging headlines without reading the article. actually put in the effort to learn about how to be antiracist and how to organize & make a change within ur community. get in touch with local groups. if you don’t have any near you, take the time to learn, listen, & spread resources. research & criticize yourself. take it easy, but take it.

here are those resources again to get started:

ORGANIZING RESOURCES doc

Master List of Black Revolutionary Readings by Timmy Chau (free pdfs, some have been taken down but most are still up, you could try googling the ones that have been deleted)

Anti-racist Resource Guide by Tasha K. (books, podcasts, movies and more)

D e c o l o n i z e : Resources by Ari Sahagún and Jay Saper (also check out resource generation)

Antisemitism: a basic guide by @bishonen and @hotgirlkakashi

yes this is a lot to take in all at once. make small goals for yourself though, try reading at least two articles a day that interest you, etc. find out what works for you.

[bugsopolis]

Celebrating Lughnasadh in the kitchen and at home

August 1st is the first hovers holiday. We celebrate the harvest of corn and wheat. Lughnasadh is known to be The Bread holiday™-

I gathered some videos and recipes about bread and other delicious food that you can bake on this day! I also found activities that can be done inside and at home for those (like myself) who are still isolating!

Youtube videos

🍓 Strawberry and Wine🍷 Tarts, the perfect dessert for Lughnasadh / Lammas - Kitchen witchery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU4qu2KlWAs

Baking a Brioche for a sabbath on a stormy day // Slow living approach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uKI1VwDoB8

Lughnasadh Bread Magick 🌾 Lammas Bread Recipe 🍞 Kitchen Witchcraft https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kk0OiPRo3Ok

Braided Bread Recipe || Lughnasadh Recipe || Kitchen Witchery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7VH8O9nrs8

Lammas recipe | Lughnasadh Honey Lavander Bread & Wild Berry Jam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ubT3i-LQWU

Tumblr recipes

Making Jam https://witchy-kitchen-craft.tumblr.com/post/623437754808827904/strawberry-and-rosemary-jam-for-joy-luck-and

Baking a Brioche https://witchy-kitchen-craft.tumblr.com/post/619474744633360384/baking-a-brioche-on-a-stormy-afternoon-a-slow

Making Fruit Pies https://witchy-kitchen-craft.tumblr.com/post/624711718492340224/strawberry-and-wine-tarts

Lammas/Lughnasadh tea

Lughnasadh Bread Recipe 🍞✨

🍁 Soda Bread for Lughnasadh/Lammas 🍂 https://andreja-luna.tumblr.com/post/176533425247/happy-lughnasadh-everyone-i-hope-everyone-had-a

honey lavender bread https://grimoireprxject.tumblr.com/post/187210413073/honey-lavender-bread

Perfect Bread: https://bloomingnova.tumblr.com/post/183592875156/i-absolutely-love-this-recipe-the-bread-is-soft

Activities that you can do at home

🌿Lammas Activities🌿

Subtle Witch Tips - Lammas / Lughnasadh

Food Correspondance

If you don’t want to follow a recipe but still want to celebrate.

Bread

Corn

Potatoes

Nuts,

Wild Berries

Strawberries

Apple,

Rice,

Squash,

Oats,

Grains,

Elderberry wine,

Ales,

Fruit pies

Also now is the time to work on your abundance spells since we are celebrating the harvest and all the abundant food!

It’s also the time to start thinking tidying up the house, start making preserves and jams in prevision of the darker months to come. In the same spirit, it’s time to finish some big projects to be clear during the darker months.

Deep cleaning your house is always a good idea, get rid of things that you don’t use to make space.

I hope you’ll have fun on this holiday. Let me know what you are planning to do!