Tarot,Fibercraft, and the Magic of Daily Life
What if you could harness the energy of the planets to organize your week? Join us for an insightful conversation with Faoladh, a queer, autistic, and ADHD witch whose unique blend of personal identity and magical practice offers a unique perspective on witchcraft in the Pacific Northwest. Faoladh shares her experiences in animism and making, including the craft of natural fiber cordage using plants like dandelions and nettles, as well as the personal depth she derives from tarot and daily rituals.
Explore the emotional and transformative power of finding one's inner strength through witchcraft. Faoladh recounts how her surroundings, particularly a senior center nestled among majestic redwood trees, ignited her journey toward personal empowerment and connection with nature. We discuss how motivations in witchcraft have evolved from self-discovery to a broader focus on family, land, and community conservation efforts. The importance of community, both local and online, is emphasized as a key element in supporting and nurturing one’s spiritual path.
Discover the joy and growth found in embracing a witchcraft practice. Faoladh highlights the clarity and fulfillment that comes from spell work, the influence of music on spiritual connection, and the resilience required to navigate magical slumps. Her practical advice for new witches—emphasizing the value of starting without hesitation and learning continually—provides an encouraging roadmap for anyone looking to begin their magical journey. Tune in for a compelling exploration of witchcraft, personal growth, and the interconnectedness of human beliefs across time.
Visit Faoladh's website! ko-fi.com/mercurialwoods
KimHost
00:04
Welcome to the Grand Canyon. In this episode of Your Average Witch, I'm talking to Faoladh, a witch in the Pacific Northwest. We talked about tarot, community, and working with the land. Before we get started, I just want to remind you of the giveaway I'm doing. This is the last week to enter. You can win one of my Sabbat boxes worth at least $75, plus one for a friend, and if you don't win, you still have time to sign up for a Lughnasadh box on my website, crepuscularconjuration.com. Each box comes with an altar cloth, a pendulum set, a piece of Clever Kim's Curios jewelry, car coasters, and a bunch of other stuff. This $75 box is yours for just $50, including shipping. Head over to crepuscularconjuration.com now to buy yours. And now let's get to the stories. Faoladh hello. Welcome to the show.
FaoladhGuest
00:59
Hi, how are you? I'm doing good, I'm surviving our little heat wave that we're having up here.
KimHost
01:13
How about you? Good, I'm dying, thanks for asking. It's hot. Can you introduce yourself and let everybody know who you are and what you do and where they can find you?
FaoladhGuest
01:21
I am known as Faoladh, my pronouns are she, her and I am residing on the traditional homelands of the Spoyalapabsh people, who have stewarded this land since time immemorial and continue to do so today. When I think of myself, oh god, like I was thinking about this question. And what are some of the words that I use to describe myself. Right, I'm queer, I'm autistic and ADHD. I am an animist. I am a maker, a crafter, a caretaker. I am up here in the Pacific Northwest and I'm excited to talk to you, Kimothy.
KimHost
02:06
So you're also real pretty. Where can people find you?
FaoladhGuest
02:12
I am kind of I don't know, I'm kind of not on much of the internet these days. I did a lot of that in the younger days of the internet and the younger days of myself, and I've kind of stepped away a lot from social media. I do have a kofi page that I am starting up, the title of which is Mercurial Woods, where I will be sharing some of the projects that I'm… (Kim: Oooo, that’s good!) thank you, some of the projects that I'm working on, some of the things that I'm exploring. Like right now I'm exploring making cordage out of natural fibers and stuff, and it's super fun.
KimHost
02:52
That's freaking cool. What do you make so far? What do you use?
FaoladhGuest
02:58
Yeah, so far. So the first one I did I was collecting a bunch of dandelion, because this year just the dandelion in my yard was so tall and I was looking at the strands of it and I was just like I can do something with those. So I started pulling them and drying them and twisting them into cord and I'm now playing with nettle. I've been on a whole kick of that. I've been playing with a few other fibers and you know the goal of it is to learn more about plants but also be able to make some cordage that people can use in spell work. That already has a little bit of intention in it. So that's what I'm doing with that. I made myself a bracelet. What's this one made out of? This one's made out of nettle.
KimHost
03:50
Yes, I want to see that. I want to see those. I want to see that, both stuff, yes, yes. So what does it mean to you when you call yourself a witch, if you do?
FaoladhGuest
04:06
Oh, this is one of my favorite questions of yours, Kim. I always love listening to the ways that people describe this and you know, the thing is, is that, which is just one of many labels? And I mean, I just spouted off a whole bunch of other ones of them and I think that was kind of like. One of my first lessons in witchcraft was that being a witch is only one part of who you are and, like, all of the other parts work together in the witchcraft. So, like when I think about when I'm a witch, it's for me, which is someone who engages in witchcraft, and engaging in witchcraft is the intentional manipulation of energy toward an outcome, and it's really as simple as that for me. How you do it, what energies you work with, how you're manipulating things, what your outcome is, those are all going to be reflective of all of the other aspects of yourself, but being a witch is one who engages in witchcraft.
KimHost
05:07
I love it when people have to define witchcraft to say this is why I'm a witch.
FaoladhGuest
05:09
Well, I'm a crafter.
KimHost
05:10
Well, I like it better than… I mean. I don't want to offend anybody, but I like it better than when people say they'd like go off about mother earth and everything. I like the very simple If you practice witchcraft, you're a witch. Witchcraft is X Y Z. If you do X Y Z, you're a witch.
FaoladhGuest
05:37
I do connect with our, with mother earth, and that is one of the energies that I connect with intentionally to manipulate and, you know, reach my own personal goals, absolutely.
KimHost
05:50
I like it. Would you say you have a family history with witchcraft or any sort of magical practice?
FaoladhGuest
06:02
No, absolutely not. My family is like-Christian denominational. My mother comes from a Baptist background that is, from the Blue Hills region in… Blue Ridge Mountains? That’s it.
KimHost
06:23
How are you going to hurt my feelings like that and say Blue Hills, that's where I'm from.
FaoladhGuest
06:29
Maybe it is the Blue Hills. Where's the Blue Hills? Which one's in Ohio?
KimHost
06:32
Blue Ridge is in Virginia.
FaoladhGuest
06:33
It might be Blue Hills then, it might be Blue Hills, I don't remember I'd have to pull up my like my whole ancestry thing, which I love looking at, but okay, but I you know, and then so I have. And then, but my dad is from, he went to a Lutheran university where my grandmother worked at, but they're not really Lutheran, and so I just I grew up in this hugely cross denominational Christian upbringing that really wasn't hugely reinforced and it was. You know, I can remember talking to my grandmother about how different services, why did I go to one church with one grandparent and one church with another grandparent? And she was very explicit that we all kind of believed the same thing. It's just how we approached it. And so I was always introduced to that kind of thing and my family was very, very supportive of having a rich fantasy life.
So I searched for Narnia my entire childhood. I still have. Well, because here's the thing tangent real quick. I didn't get it because hello, autism. I didn't get it until college, when I was in a class that was analyzing themes in literature and I was introduced to the concept that Aslan was Jesus. That's when it clicked for me. I was reading a fantasy story about a magical land that someone found in a wardrobe.
KimHost
8:20
Me too, I was an adult, right, I was an adult before, and I get it Like. I see.
FaoladhGuest
8:28
I see the analogies. I see, you know I'm not dumb, but I was reading a fantasy story about magical animals that talked and children that saved the world, and like that's what I was reading.
KimHost
08:38
Yeah, and I saw the relationships like the similarities as a kid, but I didn't know it was on purpose. I just thought, oh wow, that's interesting.
FaoladhGuest
08:49
This is a story we tell. Well, that's. The other thing is, you know, I mean a lot of our stories because we're all human. A lot of our stories follow the same kinds of rhythms and themes. So it wasn't weird that there was the similar themes or anything like that. Like you said, I just I didn't realize it was on purpose necessarily to to have Aslan Aslan be directly Jesus and all of these other direct correlations. That just didn't come into my brain. But I was allowed to explore all those things however I wanted to, and so I did and I got. You know, I spent time searching for other. I have to laugh now because in retrospect I wasn't really searching for other religion or other spirituality. I literally just like took a tour of the Christian churches in my town. I was like okay, but I was like 13, 14, please forgive me, I was expanding my religious knowledge by, you know, going down the street to the other church. But in that I did find that one of the things that I really, really love is ecstatic dance. I love dance and movement. So there's always things that I learned from all of these little forays and my family was supportive of that. They were supportive of that exploration. They were supportive of me finding my way. Nobody ever. There was no negativity when I stopped going to church. In fact, when I stopped and I made that decision, my mother was like, well, you know what? Your father made that decision way back a little bit before you were born Because quick note my parents were teenage parents. My mother was 17. My father was 18 when I was born and the church was bullshit to them. The church that had supported them supposedly and was always going to was really crappy and so my dad stopped going to church. So, like, my family was really open to that and they also are very close to the land in that they're gardeners big time. They come from generations of gardeners. My grandfather, great grandfather, he, and his brothers and sisters made it through the Great Depression with their honey farm. So we've always been really land agriculture, working with our environments-based, and that was absolutely something that I feel they passed on to me.
KimHost
11:50
Sweet, I like that for you.
FaoladhGuest
12:01
Thanks, me too. They're also like major crafters and, yeah, I got a lot of that from my family and I appreciate it.
KimHost
12:12
Can you introduce us to your daily practice?
FaoladhGuest
12:15 Oh god, I don't know… What day is it?
KimHost
12:18
Um, it's Jupiter Day.
FaoladhGuest
12:31
I know it's Jupiter Day. I already did my dancing today. Yeah well, I mean, it kind of does depend on the day, but because what is it? We have a mutual friend, Amber, who speaks of structures and rhythms and talking about having structure in your day but also allowing yourself to flow with the rhythms of what is happening. So I try to do that with my practice. But overall, I like to start off with some daily movement and I usually try to connect with what the planetary energy of the day is. I'm an animist, as I said before, and I include the planets in that, in that what I am connecting to and lighting a candle for, giving offerings for, et cetera, is the spirit of today. It's the spirit of Jupiter and as humanity we've come up with however many, I'm finding more everyday ways to represent that energy. So I'll start off my day with a little bit of focus on that and kind of seeing how I can, that and kind of seeing what, how I can apply that kind of energy to my day, to my goals for the day. Wednesdays I do a lot of sending emails and talking to people on the phone and all of that kind of stuff. Tuesdays I usually get started on some big projects because I want to harness that Mars energy. Other than that, I do a lot of sitting in my yard and watching my animals. I have a bunch of chickens and I have ducks, and spending outside or spending that time outside with them and observing them is so much fun and so restorative for me. That's a big part of my day too, my daily, and checking in with my plants and seeing all of that on a not so day-to-day basis. Let's see what else do I do. I dabble in a lot of glamour magic. Let's see what else do I do. I dabble in a lot of glamour magic. I absolutely love tarot. Tarot is a huge part of my practice overall and it's why I came to witchcraft in the first place.
KimHost
13:04
How many decks do you have?
FaoladhGuest
13:10
Okay, hold on, okay, I'll actually pull this up. I'll pull this up, so, and I'll just babble a little bit about my tarot journey for a little bit, back way back in um 2009, 2009? I had moved out of my home after well, I wasn't really living there. I was traveling around for work for a while and then I moved officially from my parents' home in Washington down to my first all mine apartment in Nevada and when I did that I definitely started to feel it was so long ago I can't even really describe what I was starting to feel, but I ended up seeing tarot and immediately feeling connection to it and at that time I bought myself to it and at that time I bought myself several Rider-Waite-Smith clones. I didn't actually buy that one. I didn't really like the art for it. Don't tell anyone. But I bought like all of the clones of it. So I had like the Robin Wood deck and I had the Morgan Greer deck and all of those.
KimHost
16:24
I love Morgan Greer.
FaoladhGuest
16:29
Morgan Greer is my favorite deck Well, I hate saying that because I'll say that about every deck but Morgan Greer is my first deck and it's been my first deck both times, Because the Queen of Wands of that deck is. I love her so much. But I got rid of all those decks because I started a relationship and I let shame which did not come from my partner, came from internally. I let shame tell me that that wasn't something that I could share and I ended up getting rid of everything I could share and I ended up getting rid of everything. And then, in 2019, I was working at a senior living facility back up here in Washington after we'd returned home and I just randomly ordered myself the Morgan Greer deck again and it arrived on my birthday. And now, as of the last addition to my spreadsheet because there is a spreadsheet, there is 117 tarot decks, 26 oracle decks and I still only have one lenormand. Good lord. I do think there's a couple that haven't been added. Oh, there you have. I do think there's a couple that haven't been added on there yet.
KimHost
17:45
Which queen did you say you like?
FaoladhGuest
17:48
The Queen of Wands, I believe, is the one I'm thinking of. My deck is in a tin and she's on the cover of it.
KimHost
17:58
I love the Lovers from Morgan Greer. Yeah, I had some like an incomplete deck and I would cut circles out of various cards and put them on a bracelet and there's like the nipple and there's a hand next to the nipple. The hand looks so graceful, it's just so pretty. It's my favorite thing in that- what did I just say… bracelet.
FaoladhGuest
18:35
That's awesome. I would love to see that bracelet. I love doing art with tarot and just the art of tarot is I mean. That's why. That's why I have the collection.
KimHost
18:48
How would you say witchcraft has changed your life?
FaoladhGuest
18:56
Oh wow, I mean, how doesn't it? I would say that for me, it definitely brought about a huge awareness of connection within and without of myself. One of my autistic superpowers is the pattern recognition and connecting of. You know, like my brains, that that meme of Charlie from uh, you're all, it's always the guy with the string all over the place.
KimHost
19:03
I've not actually seen that show.
FaoladhGuest
19:10
But well, I'm not going to tell you to watch it, because I know how that goes.
KimHost
19:13
Okay, good, thanks.
FaoladhGuest
19:16
You're welcome, but that's what my brain looks like and it does make sense. There are connections between everything I've got this whole. Oh can I- I'm going to get a little. I don't know if anybody else has thought about this. I'm going to get a little. A little weird, but like, I have this theory about the reason that, as witches and other people who are like, would you say, connected, right, we experience a lot more and are able to kind of see into the future. See into the past, we can connect to our past lives and all of that. It's because all energy is connected and so once we are connected into that, we can literally touch anywhere in history and time and space.
KimHost
20:40
Okay, Rachel. Hail Cern.
FaoladhGuest
20:45
CERN.
KimHost
20:48
Why would you say that to me?
FaoladhGuest
20:53
Cause I didn't think about it until I got to the end and really remembered who I was talking to.
KimHost
20:58
Stop it immediately.
FaoladhGuest
20:03
Okay. Oh, I'll move on. I'll move on. The awareness of the connection of all things and like how, how I can impact things, you know because I am connected to that and how I can impact and break patterns because I can see them, and so it's it's made me very aware of that interconnectedness. It's also been very empowering. I mean, I started because I wasn't feeling very personally empowered but I was feeling like highly connected to a space that was very beautiful and very natural and very welcoming of a space, and I was really lit up inside by this space that I was working in, because the senior center that I was working at was actually in the middle of a wildlife preserve and they had this beautiful grove, a circular grove of 13 redwood trees, circular grove of 13 redwood trees, and it was just the most beautiful place and it lit me up and so I was feeling powerful but not empowered, and I got into witchcraft in order to kind of begin to make sense of that and become more empowered and in doing so it helped me meet all of those like the different aspects of myself right that I was talking about that all get to work together toward what I want in life and they're all worthy of me spending time with. Even like the shitty, bitchy aspects of myself. They're worth time and that just it made me feel very, very empowered.
KimHost
22:58
That's cool.
FaoladhGuest
23:02
Oh god. And then I want to go to a circle of 13 freaking redwoods.
KimGuest
23:00
Dude!
FaoladhGuest
23:09
Right? Oh, it was so pretty. it was so pretty, and they were. I don't know if they did it on purpose, because I didn't meet the man that planned it out, but, like I said, it was just I. One day I was standing in the gazebo that's built in the middle of them and I'd been working there for a few months and I just looked around and all of a sudden, I just counted them and turned in a circle and was like holy shit, hi guys, and that actually excellent segue there, brain. The other thing, the other huge change that being a witch has brought me is community. I had to start with the community within my home and my land, and also the community of my community, and then, of course, the online witch community that I found through. Well, you and the Hive House has been incredibly supportive for my personal growth, and I definitely wouldn't have found that without witchcraft.
KimHost
24:41
Do you think they've figured out who you are?
FaoladhGuest
24:43
If not yet, oh, probably now.
KimHost
24:49
Surprise everyone, surprise HiveHouse.
FaoladhGuest
24:56
I have many names. There are some who call me Tim.
KimHost
25:02
Are there?
FaoladhGuest
25:04
Oh Jesus, get some Monty Python line Kim.
KimHost
25:08
Well, I don't remember that one, okay.
FaoladhGuest
25:11
Or I quoted it wrong. I have a lot of things stored in my head.
KimHost
25:18
Okay, I also make lame jokes that nobody remembers the references for, it's fine what is the biggest motivator in your practice and has it changed since you first started?
FaoladhGuest
25:31
Oh yeah, it has. Well, I think I just sort of said it like when I first started, it was all about understanding myself and understanding what I was feeling about being back home. Cause the other aspect of being back home is that I was back home. I live in the house that my father grew up in. It's it's a five generations of my family Now that me and my my child are child, are here, have lived in this house. It's it's a very important space and coming home was huge so, but it kind of like brought up a lot of these things that didn't totally make sense to me at the time, like trying to clear out the overgrowth in the garden, and all of a sudden I'm hit with memories of gardening with my grandmother, you know, and who is well and a lot, who is alive and well she's. She's actually, I don't, she's camping right now. That's what she does in the summer.
KimHost
26:43
Your grandmother is camping.
FaoladhGuest
26:45
Yeah, what's surprising about this? My grandpa's with her.
KimHost
25:48
Age.
FaoladhGuest
25:49
They're in a… oh, age is surprising about camping. That's fair. I will note they are camping in a very cushy RV.
KimHost
27:09
Okay that's not camping. To me that’s different. I was thinking there's two old people just in a tent on a inflatable bed. I’m not doing that.
FaoladhGuest
27:19
They gave them tents 30 years ago they haven't been, No, no, they've got.
They have ac, they're fine I barely even have ac, so I know, I know, but now we're talking about motivations yeah, I was like my motivation, where we are now all right, that's okay. Uh, yeah, okay. So let me regain my thoughts. Yeah, it started as a way to understand myself and and also to find balance, because, good lord, that is a that is a repeating theme in my life is just the constant need to find balance between all of the things, and I I know other people can relate to that for sure, um, my from myself, and once I finally started to understand myself, and that's when I came to the realization about my neurodivergency, um, and also a lot of my chronic illness that I deal with. I deal with a lot of chronic pain, so becoming more aware of that, and then I moved from that into how I could utilize all this new information about myself to support my home, to support the land that my home is on, to support my family. So it went into that big time in supporting my loved ones. But more recently, like really recently, I have definitely felt myself shifting into a time of needing to get out and do stuff in my community. So that is my, that's my next chapter of motivation is supporting my different communities, supporting my different communities.
KimHost
29:20
That makes sense with the park thing that you're doing.
FaoladhGuest
29:26
Yeah, yeah, I'm excited. My first one is this weekend. I'm stewarding a work party at one of our local parks for conservation. It's going to be really exciting. I mean I'm excited to rip out blackberry.
KimHost
29:54
What would you say is your biggest struggle when it comes to your practice?
FaoladhGuest
29:59
I feel like this is a boring answer, but it's consistency. I think we all struggle with it. I don't know. I feel like that's a really common answer with people, but definitely consistency because of I mean I could gesture wildly at everything that's going on that impacts my mood on a day-to-day basis. I'm, as previously mentioned, autistic and ADHD, so I struggle with the balance of I need structure in my life, but also I need spontaneous action. That's fun. I am also chronically ill, so some days I wake up and I don't really have a lot of ability to walk around or do dance, which is a big part. Music and stuff is a big part of today. I was doing the Jupiter dancing for prosperity and protection and expansion and all of those things that we dance in the hive house to Jupiter, for I could do that today. I can't always do that, so adapting my practice to be able to be consistent in what I'm putting into it has been interesting. That's definitely a big obstacle for me.
That's definitely a big obstacle for me. Also, time. Time is stupid and I don't respect it.
KimHost
31:30
I enjoyed that statement. I agree. Let's talk about imposter syndrome.
FaoladhGuest
31:45
Oh okay.
KimGuest
31:46
Do you have it?
FaoladhGuest
31:49
Do I have it? I don't know. I mean yeah, but maybe no. But also, yeah, I don't know. Sometimes, sometimes I think it's okay, sometimes I think it's okay, sometimes I think it's, it's good, like it's good, to look at what is happening around you and be like, oh, maybe I should adjust some things. And you know, am I, am I doing the best that I could? Maybe I don't know what the fuck I'm doing and I should stop. Yeah, maybe spend some time reading a book? Totally.
But I also think that we compare ourselves too much and that that can definitely create self-imposed expectations and boundaries and limitations to what we are capable of, and boundaries and limitations to what we are capable of. So I also don't really. There's an aspect of imposter syndrome that I think is very, very beneficial and it facilitates growth. And then there's an aspect of it that I think is a product of our current world's social views and we need to get out of. I experience both. I agree with both. One of them I'm fighting, the other one I am embracing.
KimHost
33:32
What brings you the most joy in your practice?
FaoladhGuest
33:34
Part of there's, there's a, there's a couple of things. Part of the whole recognizing patterns is the moment when all of the information that I've taken in clicks into intention, it clicks into knowledge, it clicks into clarity. That moment I love, that moment. I'll be working on maybe a spell, I'll have a vague idea of it in mind and I'll be collecting just ingredients that for some reason, I'm like, okay, I'm going to stick this over in the pile of this spell that I'm vaguely working on, and then one day I the spell is ready and I just I know it, I have all the ingredients, I'll look it up. It's usually a good day for it, you know, and I do it. That moment of click and clarity, I love that. Dance brings me incredible joy. I'm not a dancer. I use dance in heavy quotation marks. I move my body in response to the music. I didn't realize that this was stimming until I was an adult, but that's what I love using dance and movement and the energy and joy that it can grow and bring into being and raise. Raise is the word I'm looking for Within myself is, is. I love that. I also just love supporting my, my peoples when I've, like, made a thing and then a person needs that thing and I'm like, oh, I have this thing and you can have this thing, and then that thing helps them. I find a lot of joy in my practice.
KimHost
35:23
Huh, what's something you did early in your practice that you don't do anymore, and why don't you do it?
FaoladhGuest
35:31
Oh, there's so much that I don't do anymore. One thing is that I don't. I try very hard not to limit myself based on outside expectations, um sort of like that imposter syndrome thing, right, like I'm the one who should be setting the expectations for what I'm doing. It shouldn't be other people outside of me. So people you know I'm, I'm I'm going to use this just an example, but the sort of like the notion of a year and a day before you start practicing, right, I'm not really into people telling me how to do the things that I want to do. Lord, I just I will do it. Give me the goal, I will do the thing. I will get there in my own time, I will do it my way and yeah, so I definitely try not to limit myself and I remember when I first started, when I first started doing practice of like learning herbs and how to connect to energies and protecting and learning the craft part of of it, I was definitely swept up in that are you a green witch, are you a kitchen witch? Are you a blah, blah, blah? And very quickly it was well, I'm not any of these things. I'm all of these things. Just depends on the day and what I'm doing. So not limiting myself based on labels and what other people thought are the limitations of those labels. I don't mess with that anymore. I also don't dismiss the value of knowledge that I can find in shit I don't believe in, like there are many friends that I have in the witchcraft world that I don't necessarily believe, think, practice. I don't go about magic the same way that they do, but when they share about how they do it, there is still knowledge in that that is very valuable to my perspective of the world. So things like astrology I do not dismiss astrology anymore. Used to, Used to big time because I don't really connect with my sun sign, but having some more steady input about astrology and really the function of it and how it interacts with yourself and all of that, I uh, I don't dismiss it anymore. I use it as a tool. I don't dismiss. I used to describe myself as an atheist, though I'm an animist. I also described myself as an atheist because I don't. I didn't believe in the gods, and I'm changing my language on that because another thing I will describe myself as as an omnis, who believes that your belief in a thing makes it real. So everybody's beliefs are real, like I. I do believe that you're you. You have believed in a thing and many other people have believed in that thing, the same way that you have believed in that thing, and that thing is real. The velveteen rabbit yeah, right, and like that applies, I. I have, I have come to believe that applies to things like the gods, the aspects of Zeus and Jupiter and Marduk and some of the other Jupiterian gods. They exist because people believe or believed in them and they put that energy into it. So they exist. And studying their stories and connecting to those so what I'm looking for no, connecting to that representation is valuable to my practice, so I don't dismiss those things anymore.
KimHost
40:44
Yeah, I, Rachel suggested working with Jupiter, like I don't know however many years ago, two, three years ago, and I was. I scoffed a little bit in my head, but obviously I don't do that anymore.
FaoladhGuest
41:07
Right, well, I got it. Okay. So I have to tell you so I I have been very connected to Jupiter and two of the big ways in which I have is that when I was very young, in first or second grade, my school put on this presentation of the planets it was a solar system thing and my class was Jupiter and I was the great red spot and I know I fucking loved it. It was so fun, so fun and like what we had to do was we were all supposed to clump together like a planet, okay, and then move around, and then all the other classes had like they were their own planets and they would move around like the solar system and stuff. But as the great red spot, which does move on the surface, right, I got to move around. So I ran around my class while they went around the solar system, moving far, throwing bows, yeah, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's cool, yeah, yeah. And then later on in life I was majorly obsessed with I don't know why I speak in past tense like this, I'm still obsessed with Sailor Moon, and Sailor Jupiter was my sailor. She was someone I could so relate to because she was I mean, she was taller than every one of her friends I'm always taller than all of my friends she had this really hidden soft side that was very protective and nourishing, but she had this really, really tough, I'm going to kick your ass exterior. And I hugely related to her and then you know, and just sort of these little interesting things of Jupiter that pop up here and there through my life. But then so I came to you by way of WBAH, Witch, Bitch Amateur Hour and around the same time that I came to check out Your Average Witch, I went to check out two G's and Lee, our friends over there, and the very first episode I was listening to, Rrachel just started going off about Jupiter and dancing and all of this stuff and I was like, oh, and then I went and listened to you and I think the first episode I listened to you mentioned something about having a Thursday Jupiter dance party in the Hive House and I signed up for the Hive House.
KimHost
43:37
Really??
FaoladhGuest
Yeah, because it was dance and it was Jupiter and it was like all these things that I had already connected with on my own and I was like, well, shit, I need to see what these ladies are about .
KimHost
43:50
That's so cool. What is your favorite tool? It does not have to be a physical object and how do you use it?
FaoladhGuest
44:00
Okay, let's see my favorite tool I could do. Tarot, the power of friendship, oh no, cannabis. Cannabis is a good tool for me, big ally, but no Music. I'm going to go with music.
KimHost
44:17
Oh.
FaoladhGuest
44:20
Music is so incredibly powerful I might start crying. I am not a musician. I married one. I can kind of pluck a little bit on the guitar or, you know, maybe play like jingle bells. I'm not a musician. I don't sing none of it, uh, at least not well but music is hugely impactful for me. When I think about my ancestors, I think about the music that they introduced me to. I mean, I I spent some time for a while like thinking about the different kinds of music that I listened to and I'm like, oh, my love of doo-wop and that kind of 50s, and that comes from my grandfather and us cruising around in his old Toyota blasting the oldies station. My love of classic country comes from my great grandfather, my love of sixties and seventies. I don't know folk, I'm not good at genres, because everything crosses genre, because everything's connected. Everything's connected, but that comes from my grandparent, my other grandparents, gam, everything's connected, but that comes from my other grandparents. It's just so connective to my history and me as a person the way that putting on the right kind of music can completely change the mood. Music is incredibly powerful and I will use it to build energy. I will use it to clear energy. I will use it to protect, I will use it to heal, I will use it to do all of the things because it is so powerful.
KimHost
46:18
This is going to make Anahata’s so fun!
FaoladhGuest
46:19
I know I can't wait to dance with everyone
KimHost
46:23
I know! How do you pull yourself out of a magical slump?
FaoladhGuest
46:30
, I don't.
KimHost
46:31
Oh. Good.Do you wallow?
FaoladhGuest
46:33
I don't wallow. Well, okay, I used to. I used to try to pull myself out of it and then, when I couldn't, I would wallow in it because it was like I'd failed. I failed to pull myself out of this. I'm such a failure and I'd wallow in it. Now it's more about leaning in, because I think the low periods teach us something, and I think the low periods teach us something and I think they're there for a reason and, as someone who does deal with chronic illness, when I don't rest, my body will force me to. That's just how it works. I will rest, whether I want to or not, and I can rest regularly and help build myself up, or I can be forced to sit the fuck down and do nothing because I can't move and I. Those low periods, for me, are that indication that I need to take that break and I need to take that rest. So I lean into it more these days and try to figure out what it is that it's teaching me, which usually means tarot and other card pulls, usually means meditation, usually means a lot of reading, but I don't. I don't. On the other hand, sometimes you have to get yourself out of them, sometimes we get stuck in them and that can be really rough them, and that can be really rough. And I think for me, one thing that has in the past held me back from being able to like when my brain feels ready and even my body feels ready to do things, but for some reason I just can't. One, I recognize my neurodivergency. Two, I have to look at what I need for support in that. And three, I've got to find the new thing that lights me up, and sometimes I am hesitant to do that because it might mean stopping working on something that was really, really important for me for a little while, but now I find I'm not finding any joy in it. Like I will crochet for months on end and then one day I pick up my crochet and it is not doing anything for me and I have to be okay in putting that down and recognizing that, even though the project may not be finished, I'm ready to move on to something else.
KimHost
49:25
That sounds healthy. I just found my palm stone!
FaoladhGuest
49:28
Nice. Where was it?
KimHost
It was in my boobs. I forgot. I put it there because it was cold.
FaoladhGuest
49:44
So it needed to get warmed up.
KimHost
49:46
It's warm now. It's gold-sheen obsidian.
FaoladhGuest
49:40
I've got the necklace. Darlena made the moss agate with jasper one. It gets very warm between my boobs too.
KimHost
50:02
What is something you wish was discussed more in the witch community?
FaoladhGuest
50:08
Okay, so I'm not really in the larger witch community. I was on TikTok for a little while and dipped my toe into witch talk and after about a year of recognizing how detrimental the app was in general to my mental health, I deleted it. So I'm not really necessarily up to date on what people are talking about in the community, I guess I want to say. But one of the things that I do wish we talked about how, how all of our human beliefs have evolved over time, because so I'm also an archeologist. That is what my degree is in. That was my first career. I know I'm dropping some lore on you right now. I know I know my degree is in anthropology and archaeology. The thing that brought me to it was seeing how fucking human we all are. We are so human and every single one of us is so human and we always, always have been. I mean, from the ancient Greek graffiti that talks you know about essentially for a good time. Call to the ancient Viking graffiti that says you know time. Call to the ancient Viking graffiti that says you know Eric was here Right, like we are so fricking human and all we want to do is like make our mark on the world and all we want it's it's it's beautifully connected, and one of the ways in which I see that is in how our spirituality is, because when you look at the basis for a lot of our deities that a lot of us are familiar with, a lot of them go back to the same region with a lot of them go back to the same region, and what we see is like this separation and the defragmentation of these things over time into different cultures that now we're all like somehow these people, these thoughts are at odds with each other when they actually originated from the same place, and it confuses me and I think more people need to talk about it.
KimHost
53:09
Do we talk about it?
FaoladhGuest
53:15
Not really, not really. I mean, I've talked about it with some people, but I don't know that we've really had a discussion about it in the group. You have wonderful discussions in the group. I love that.
KimHost
53:33
That's one of the things I posted in the group, next week when I post it on the Facebook group, this week's guest said what do you think?
FaoladhGuest
53:44
There we go, there we go. Yeah, we do have a lot of really great and great discussions in there, and that's kind of one of the reasons why it's a little bit difficult for me to even answer this question is because I feel like we have a lot of really good discussions and we might have really short ones, or you might have longer ones and get involved and go on a million different tangents, but we talk about a lot of that, a lot of stuff in in the Marco Polo group. So I don't, I don't really know what are people talking about in the witchcraft world.
KimHost
54:19
I don't know the gossip I don't remember, I don't know. No one expects you right now. I'm in the closet right now. I don't know.
FaoladhGuest
54:36
No one expects you to keep up with the kids, Grandpa.
KimHost
54:38
I'm in the closet right now I don't know what's happening on those interwebs. I'm in my closet right now, sweating. Think of your three biggest influences on your practice, whether it's people, pets, philosophies, a song. Thank them each one for what effect they have on your practice.
FaoladhGuest
55:07
All right. So first the people Shout out to Charlye and Macy, hey, yep, love those babes. In 2019, when I came back to my tarot practice, I started poking around about podcasts and they were one of the first ones I found and I immediately connected with them. I related hard to a lot of what each of them was going through at the time. There were a lot of fun synchronicities that were happening. Something would happen to me and then two days later they'd put out a podcast and something similar will have happened to one of them and we just it. I'd heard them talking about you, Kim, for a couple of years, and then I made the connection that that Kim was this Kim and she had a podcast that also was interesting. So they brought me to you and from you know, I, I'm just gonna. It's, it's a pre thank you because I’m going to Anahata's purpose this year. I know I'm so excited. I can't wait for the learning, I can't wait for the river, I can't wait for the dancing.
KimHost
57:01
I can't wait for the hanging out in person!
FaoladhGuest
57:05
All of you people In real life. You won't just be these people in my phone, You'll be real, actual human beings. I don't know what to do about that. Sometimes it might be really awkward for the first couple of days. We'll see, but yeah. So Charlye and Macy big time. I think that I would have continued to, I don't think I would have continued to explore witchcraft. I think I probably would have stayed more in tarot and divination exclusively if it wasn't for WBAH and such, was that one. That was one. My second one I'm going to thank the land. I'm going to thank my home. This one, I'm actually going to cry. So we're going to take some deep breaths.
KimHost
58:16
Good lord, if you cry, I will probably.
FaoladhGuest
58:20
I know, I know. Well, you know I mentioned that I I moved around a lot immediately after college and that was because of archaeology. I went to Colorado for a while. I was down in East Texas, I was in Texarkana area, so East Texas, mostly in Western Louisiana. Then I was in Northeast Nevada and then I came back up to the Pacific Northwest and realized how much I miss Nevada. So I moved down there and I love Nevada. It's gorgeous, I love the desert, it's beautiful. But I didn't realize how disconnected I was with the land until I came back home, because the moment I was home I was home. Hold on for crying the way that this land greeted me when I returned.
KimHost
59:54
That's why I was crying in the river, dude!
FaoladhGuest
01:00:00
I get it. It was like the mossiest hug, like just just just just curling up on the forest floor. It was, it was home. So I have to thank all the flora, fauna and fungi of the Pacific Northwest. I have to thank the waters here. I have to thank Mount Tahoma, the beautiful, terrifying volcano I live in the shadow of. I have to thank the land. Oh, and I got one more, but I'm crying so much.
KimHost
01:00:46
Is your laundry done?
FaoladhGuest
01:00:51
I don't get it oh are you hearing something?
KimHost
01:00:53
I hear music.
FaoladhGuest
01:00:53
You know what? I think it's an ice cream truck. And then I think my third biggest influence that I'd have to think would be tarot. Uh, I already mentioned that back in 2009, when I moved to Nevada I don't even know what brought me there Probably some internet forum kind of space but I ended up getting the Morgan Greer tarot deck I wasn't into the Rider-Waite-Smith and from there I also got the Robin Wood tarot and then several others that were kind of just the copies, like the so many, so many interpretations. Obviously there's, there's so many of them. I had several, and one of the things that drew me in about it was that I immediately connected to the archetypes that were being represented. Just, it was something that I saw in story. It was something that I had seen represented in archaeological history. It was something that I could see these different archetypes and aspects of humanity and why we'd done, why tarot was set up the way that it was, and it just these different archetypes and aspects of humanity and why we'd done, why tarot was set up the way that it was. And it just made sense to me and I can remember the first time I actually connected with my ancestors, which I didn't realize I was necessarily doing. I mean, I I knew what I was doing and I did it intentionally, but I didn't really understand anything about ancestors or ancestor veneration or anything like that. But I immediately connected with what I knew was my grandfather, my great grandfather, so my dad's, dad's dad. He was a very big influence on the beginning of my life and he's still a big part of my ancestor practice. He was the first one that came back. I feel like I should sneak in a thank you to my ancestors here, because without them, none of this could be could be occurring. But he was the first one that responded when I picked up tarot again and tried to communicate, and that was another thing that felt like coming home, because I think I mentioned before that one of the reasons that I got away from Tarot was that I had started a relationship with a man who's now my husband and he didn't do anything. It was a completely self-imposed restriction and shame, but I didn't feel comfortable opening up and in response to not feeling comfortable, I just shut it all down and I got rid of my cards and everything. Shut it all down and I got rid of my cards and everything, and it wasn't until I came back and started to feel that real reconnection. I started the second time. I took a uh, an old deck of cards and and created a divination deck out of those. First because I was like, well, you know, maybe, maybe I don't really, maybe I'm not really interested in this, maybe it doesn't make sense to me. It was just a time in my life when it did and it's not really something that I'm going to connect with again. But creating that deck of cards for divination, for Myself, and then, in combination with the reconnection and the relighting of my soul, I guess that I was feeling at the time. I immediately understood it was like, no, I'm going to reorder a deck, I'm going to get one. I got Morgan Greer and it it always has the answer, even if I don't want to hear it. I it's one of the first things I do in the morning to check in with myself, to check in with the spaces around me, to check in with you know how I'm doing about goals. It's it's one of the first things I go to when I'm trying to make a decision that might have big impact, like whether or not I should approach my friend to be on her podcast.
KimHost
01:05:19
I'm glad you did.
FaoladhGuest
01:05:22
Yeah, well, you know, the cards told me to stop living in a fear mindset and grow. So I try to listen, because there are days when I haven't listened and paid for it. So I do my best. So there's my third thank you. I want to thank Tarot for all of the inspiration it has given to not just me but others, so that I may see all of the inspiration it has given to not just me but others, so that I may see all of their tarot-related artwork and hoard it like the deck dragon that I am, and enjoy them and gain knowledge and insight and opportunity from them.
KimHost
01:06:56
Have you been watching the Arcana Verte deck develop?
FaoladhGuest
01:07:01
I think I am. Yes, I follow a few. I love her work so much I follow a few, but yes, I believe I'm. I know which one you're talking about.
KimHost
01:07:09
And yes, I want her to. I keep wanting to say post it in my group. I really want to like be bossy, but I don't, because you know, that's bossy. Look, how dare you. What advice do you have for new witches?
FaoladhGuest
01:07:37
Oh, what advice? Uh, just do it. That's my advice. Don't worry about where to start, just start, because guess what? You're never gonna stop. You're never gonna stop learning. So just start somewhere, just start. One of the most important lessons that one of my last supervisor at work taught me. She had a background in IT and she told me one time she was like when we are in IT, we put out programs when they are 80% perfect, because we know that they're never going to be 100% perfect. We know that we can't catch all of the bugs before it. We know that other people will. We know that we're going to have to do another release of it. So you put it out.
And she was telling me this because I was taking forever to put plans into motion. I was taking all of this time to plan and I would never do anything about it. And I'm still struggling with this. But, like, her point was just do it, just start somewhere. Just to paraphrase Carrie Fisher be afraid and do it anyway. Just do the thing, just start. You're going to fuck up, you're going to have to take steps back, you're going to have a million new perspectives thrown at you, but just start somewhere, just do something and if you're ever lost, go back to your foundations and by that I mean the earth and the elements and grounding yourself in them, and I mean your ancestors, the foundations of you. Go back to your foundations, but just do something.
KimHost
01:09:34
I like that one. I like that one.
FaoladhGuest
01:09:39
That was cool. I'm often paralyzed by the concept of what do I do next, and the answer is always just do something.
KimHost
01:09:50
Huh, that's stressful, yeah, who do you think I should have on the show?
FaoladhGuest
01:09:59
Oh my gosh, this is such a hard question, Kim, because you're my source for new people. You know?
KimHost
01:10:09
You're my source. What the hell? What am I supposed to do now?
Faoladh
01:10:11
I know, I know. I do have a couple, though. I do have a couple, but they're okay. So the the first one is there's a person on Instagram and I only know their Instagram handle, but it's Wolf Woman Energy, and I know that on their bio they discussed being an energy worker and they've discussed witchcraft at other points. So I would love to hear more from them and in actual discussion, rather than like the little, the little videos and things that are tick tock and reels and that I know. I said I'm not on tick tock, that's because she's did I say she's on Instagram, I don't remember, but her.
01:11:07
There's another one that might be a little weird. His name is Mark Green. He is an author. He wrote a book called Atheopaganism and I don't recall the one he just came out with, but it's through Llewellyn. He just did a talk through the Llewellyn Con this summer and he also hosts a podcast called the Wonder. I'm not really sure that he identifies as a witch, but I think his thoughts on living as a pagan without necessarily living religiously as a pagan, if that makes sense I think his thoughts are interesting on that. So I'm not really sure that he would identify necessarily as a witch, but he could be an interesting conversation. And then the third person I'm going to say is someone I'm newly familiar with, newly familiar with. That sounds a little weird, but his name is David Winston. He's an herbalist and, from what I can tell, a fairly well-known one within herbalism. I've been listening to a couple of podcasts lately that he has made an appearance on and the way he speaks about connecting to the plants and he what sorts of combinations to make, and I just get the impression from him that he could be a really, really interesting person to talk to.
KimHost
01:13:16
Cool. That wolf woman energy is not on Instagram that I could see.
FaoladhGuest
01:13:24
You might be spelling it slightly wrong. She puts an X in woman instead of an E.
KimHost
01:13:26
Okay, I'll look later.
FaoladhGuest
01:13:34
Yeah, you'll look later.
KimHost
01:13:36
Well, is there anything that you wanted to talk about that I didn't ask? Or did you have any questions for me?
FaoladhGuest
01:13:43
I did have a question for you. I was wondering.
KimHost
01:13:53
No. I refuse.
Faoladh
01:13:53
Fine, I'll just go home. Tell me about your class at Anahata's.
KimHost
01:13:59
Are you serious??
FaoladhGuest
01:04:02
I want to know what you're doing!
KimHost
01:14:13
It’s the Intuitive Spellcrafting class.
FaoladhGuest
01:14:15
I know. Tell me about it.
KimHost
01:14:16
Oh, I will do that in the, I'll do that in the members only part.
FaoladhGuest
01:14:19
Okay okay, okay, then we can skip that question.
KimHost
01:14:22
The last two things I ask of guests are, number one- please recommend something, anything to the listeners.
FaoladhGuest
01:14:29
Oh no, oh god, this is the one I didn't prepare for. Oh no, start your day with music. Start your day with music. Just put something in your brain, just start it that way, see easy, that was the easy one.
KimHost
01:15:12
Thing number two is…
FaoladhGuest
01:15:13
Also go find your local Ukrainian market and eat all of their delicious food.
KimHost
01:15:16
Oh yeah, man, I am envious.
FaoladhGuest
01:15:19
I am out of vanilla buns now.
KimHost
01:15:24I don't know that I have that.
FaoladhGuest
01:15:26
I know not everyone does. That's why I can't really recommend it, because not everyone has it.
KimHost
01:15:32
Thing number two is tell me a story, please.
FaoladhGuest
01:15:37
Kim. You have no idea how this question haunts me, because I think every single time I listen to one of these episodes, I think to myself what story would I tell kim? Story do I tell Kim? And I think I'm going to tell you about one of my most embarrassing moments.
KimHost
01:16:08
Hot damn.
FaoladhGuest
01:16:10
No, no, no, no, no. Okay. So let me take a drink here, drinking some of that Bee Tea. Okay. So one of my most embarrassing moments I was in high school and I believe this was my senior year. It doesn't matter much, but I was a camp counselor for a week in the district. All of the sixth graders they don't do this anymore but they would all go to a week-long camp. It was sort of a celebration of them moving on to middle school and all of that. So they would go to a week-long camp and then high schoolers would be the camp counselors and I had already done it one year and it was a great time. And then I went the second year and it was also a great time. But one of the activities is to put on a little skit, is to put on a little skit, and they had a book of camp-approved skits and they were all little silly, five-minute kids-can-easily-learn-them sorts of things. So my skit is called, the one my campers agree on is called The Echo and essentially in this one I am a, it echoes back part of what they've said. Right, it's an echo. And then one child is playing the echo. So there's just like a couple of funny things and you know, and little kid jokes. And then I am supposed to be the last person and the child right before me is supposed to yell out my favorite sandwich is baloney, or something along those lines. And then I'm supposed to yell out I'm the greatest camp counselor in the world. And then the echo is supposed to respond with baloney, and everyone explodes in laughter and that's the end joke, and it's hilarious, right, right, okay. Here's the embarrassing thing, though. So I have all of my campers and we've all been practicing and we're all in a line, and there's this stage, loosely, uh, it's, it's just wood. And I go to say my first line, which is, you know, welcome to the Grand Canyon. And I hop up and I trip and fall flat on my face oh no, in front of the entire camp, which is not only all of the sixth graders from my district, it's sixth graders from other districts too and all of the camp counselors, and, like all of the ridiculous graders from my district, it's sixth graders from other districts too, and all of the camp counselors and, like all of ridiculous, just flat on my face. And then I got up.
I made some joke about the first step being a doozy Cause it was all I could think of.
KimHost
01:20:02
Good thinking
FaoladhGuest
01:20:03
Yeah. But here's the thing. I would have been great, play it off. So we get through the entire skit and at the end you know there's clapping from the campers and whatever, and I, we all exit and I go off and I come around and I'm standing next to the other counselors and one of them, who was a good friend of mine, I leaned over to him and I was like how bad was that? And he was like he says to me, he says literally all I heard was you yell, welcome to the grand Canyon, fall on your face. And then nothing else. The kids weren't projecting enough… nobody could hear anything, so all it was was me falling on my face.
KimHost
01:20:49
That is perfection Yeah, thanks everyone, yeah, yeah, yeah, thank you so much for being on the show.
FaoladhGuest
01:20:53
Oh my gosh, I was so happy to be here. I love talking to you.
KimHost
01:20:58
Yay, oh good, I like talking to you too. Everybody click the link to follow down below and I will see you on the internet and I will see you on, marco. Okay, bye!
FaoladhGuest:
01:21:00
Bye!
KimHost
01:21:01
Faoladh. I mean, you're home. It's Hive House. Welcome to it.
FaoladhGuest
01:21:32
I guess. Oh, I didn't realize you were saying hello.
KimHost
01:21:34
Yeah, I did that on purpose, so it confuses everyone.
FaoladhGuest
01:21:42
Good, and then you get a funny intro. Every time Good, good, good, good.
KimHost
01:21:45
Say when.
FaoladhGuest
01:21:48
When?
KimHost
01:21:49
Was that a question or were you saying it?
FaoladhGuest
01:21:51
It's both.
KimHost
01:21:52
Oh okay.
FaoladhGuest
01:22:03
I'm sorry, it started as a question and then I heard the card shuffling, so I realized why.
KimHost
01:22:07
What do you believe is in outer space and other galaxies?
FaoladhGuest
01:22:09
Uh, more of the same. Um, yeah, I probably like we're not that special. There's probably other assholes out there. Um, I, I think it's… (fades out)
KimHost
01:22:31
To hear more of the members only episode, head over to crepuscularconjuration.com. The Monthly Magic tier will give you access to the Monthly Magic Marco Polo group, the private Facebook group, and access to the written monthly spells. There's also Crepuscular Conjurations, giving you bonus podcast episodes, coloring pages, guided meditations, spell crafting videos, printable downloads and a lot more. The free Witchy Wonderment level will give you a little sample of everything I just mentioned. You can also visit my shop, Clever Kim's Curios, to get spell boxes, one at a time or by monthly subscription, intentional handcrafted jewelry that I make especially for witches and handmade altar tools. You can even listen to the full Your Average Witch podcast library, including show notes and transcripts. Check it out at crepuscularconjuration.com. Thanks for listening to this episode of Your Average Witch. You can find us all around the internet on Instagram @youraveragewitchpodcast, facebook.com/groups/hivehouse, at www.youraveragewitch.com, and at your favorite podcast service. If you'd like to recommend someone for the podcast, like to be on it yourself, or if you'd like to advertise on the podcast, send an email to youraveragewitchpodcast at gmailcom. Thanks for listening and I'll see you next Tuesday.