Conquering Death, Making Magick - My History with my Path

my history with religion has always been complicated. having been raised in a christianity-based cult until I was 7 and then thrown into living in the very agnostic country of japan, religion to me was associated with fear, oppression, and disappointing my family for a very long time.

even as a young child being indoctrinated from every angle, I was always the "weird girl" who was obsessed with anything otherworldly and horrific. I loved the idea of dead things, horror, and ghosts, and was also incredibly drawn to fairies. I asked my parents for books on fairies, I was told no and that those things were driven by satan. I asked for children's horror and thriller books, I was told no and that those things were of the devil. I didn't have any close friends in my young childhood, aside from children who found my interests shocking to hear about and entertaining to make fun of.

after moving to Japan, my interests did not fade. my home in southern kyoto was mountainous shrine country, filled with many superstitious families and ghost stories. I was continually drawn to stories of spirits wandering the countryside, although my practical aunt (primarily in charge of raising me at the time) told me not to indulge things like that. I often discussed rumors and tales of ghosts with my classmates, although they found my expressed intentions to look for said ghosts to be bold and rather strange.

it was at this point in my life that I began to experience the first evidence of my natural clairsentience. I had always been an extremely vivid and intense daydreamer, finding it very easy to disappear into landscapes in my mind for hours at a time. however, my experiences started to take more of a turn at this age. I would often slip into intense images of the kyoto countryside, where I would interact with strange creatures ranging from humans to those far from humanoid. I would sometimes get so lost in these visions, my aunt recalls that there were times as a child that she would yell my name two feet from my face and I was completely unable to hear her, totally lost in something she didn't understand.

these were imagery only for me, untold to anyone else, until I encountered a woman whose name I recognized as being that of a classmate's grandmother who had passed a year prior. she spoke to me - she was kind, and mentioned my classmate's name. not thinking anything of it or knowing any better, I told her about it the next day at school.

she was terrified. she told her mother, who confronted my aunt and told her I was cursed and should never tell stories like that to her child again. my aunt, despite standing up for me at the time, scolded me for going too far and told me to keep tall tales like that to myself in the future.

this was I think my first inkling that something was "different" about the way I was experiencing this idea of spirits and the world. I kept it to myself from then on, terrified of upsetting anyone and wanting to fit in - but I continued to experience these far away visions, and to have beings approach me in my dreams. I started to write about it in a little pink journal that I kept hidden under my mattress.

moving back to america when I was 14 was mentally exhausting for me. I was struggling with my mental health, with bullying, with my transness, and with intense loneliness and culture shock. people who knew me at this time have remarked that I was extremely shut off and rarely spoke to anyone. I found myself back in christianity, being made to go to church twice a week and say the right lines to make people around me happy. it was a very dark time for my mental health, and for a long while I forgot about the visions, the love of ghosts, and any connection to the spiritual world. however, something sparked in me during another 4am up on my tablet, where I dove in the internet and found an article about astral travel.

as I read about the astral and the experience of traveling, I thought to everything I'd ever experienced regarding going to other places in my head, visiting people and beings and experiencing other things. in a time of severe mental health struggles, it gave me a lot of hope to think that something I'd been told was wrong might have a bigger meaning and purpose. this led me to many other pages about paganism and witchcraft - about crystals, spirits, tarot, and the wide world of forming a witchy path. to me, someone who had grown up in a cult and continued to experience religious abuse, this was a glimmer of freedom to me. a sign that maybe, just maybe, there was something more for me out there.

I was 16 at the time, and discussion of where I would go to college was already underway. I made the quiet personal decision that when I moved out and went to college, I would fully convert to paganism.

I began to practice witchcraft in my own quiet, hidden ways away from the eyes of my family. I had 0 personal income or any way of buying things online, much less getting them into the house unnoticed. as such, I often scrounged through nature for things to do spells with. flowers, mushrooms, sticks, leaves, pinecones, even weeds and dirt were things I could use to do little spells and rituals with. I spent my time up late at night researching the meanings and uses of different plants. most spell guides involved things I could not access, like candles and crystals, so early on I began to learn how to make my own spells, learn my own way, and discover my own power.

I've seen some refer to this sort of thing as "poor witchcraft." classism and racism behind all that aside, I truthfully look back on those early times very fondly. to this day I believe that your biggest asset as a witch is not your tools, your ingredients, or the fancy things you can buy, but your belief in yourself and your ability to harness your own internal power. confidence is everything as a witch, and I had to learn that early on with nothing but the earth and my own imagination to rely on. the spells I made were simple, but they taught me a lot about being creative and resourceful without relying on money.

the time I spent at college was, truthfully, one of the hardest periods of my life. my chronic illness began to develop here, and I struggled severely with my mental health almost more than I had before. however, I again look back on this time in my path with a lot of fondness. I started dating my wife at this age, and threw myself headfirst into the world of exploring paganism and witchcraft without my family hovering over me.

I was very eclectic during this time - I experimented with many different kinds of craft, and honored + worked with many deities as I tried to learn how I wanted to practice. my patrons I will cover on other pages, but I met them during this time and they were a big support as I struggled to find a footing and an identity. it was here that, just like in childhood, I found myself drawn to death and to spirits.

I was incredibly fascinated by spirit work and by the idea of working with the dead, both with ghosts and with ancestors. however, when I tried to look into it, the response I received from my spirit guides and deities was a resounding "No." I wasn't ready. if this was something I really felt called to, then I had a lot of work to do.

I had always been terrified of the idea of dying. due to my past and my family, death to me spoke of eternal condemnation and suffering. if I was to work with the dead, to help spirits, I needed to begin to work through this fear. I did a lot of shadow work during this time, digging deep into my fears, my memories, and my thoughts. I dabbled in very basic spirit work as well, stumbling unprotected through pendulum sessions with various entities, and experienced some very scary hauntings by malicious ones as a result. I made a lot of mistakes, but they're not ones I truly think I regret. I learned a lot during this time, and it was a gateway into my path becoming what it is today.

I only did one semester of college before I decided to drop out. it affected my mental health too badly, so I moved back home and decided to focus on getting a job and my relationship with my girlfriend and her (later our) kids - and, in addition, on furthering my path based on what I experienced and worked on in college.

I began to interact with the concept of death not as something imminent and scary, but as an essential part of life and something present as cycles in everything. death is more in my practice than just the loss of life - it is the loss of a relationship, the loss of life events and circumstances you feel you were robbed of, the loss of parts of yourself as you grow and change. it's an intrinsic part of being alive, and something I both treat with respect and incorporate into most of my spells and rituals.

finding my footing in this as my path drastically improved my experience with spirit work. when helping, contacting, and working with spirits of the dead, it's important to not only respect them as they are, but understand where they're coming from. I worked hard to harness my natural clairsentience and practice discernment, protection and warding, and communication skills. this allowed me to eventually extend these skills not only to the dead, but to the fae, extraterrestrials, demons, and beyond.

being reinitiated into my indigenous culture also had a huge impact on my craft. ancestor work is a big part of my nation's culture, and understanding who came before you is seen as essential to life and nature. this, too, is death in motion - that those who passed before you helped make who you are today, and that you, too, will watch over future generations.

writing this today, I don't know everything, and I still have a lot to learn and explore. however, I'm very happy with how far I've come. converting and practicing has genuinely made huge improvements on my confidence and stability, and allowed me an outlet of spirituality and joy in my life. it has bonded me to my wife and given me a path and purpose I can call uniquely mine.

I don't know yet where the future will take me, but I'm excited to see it and tackle it head on.