Hello, witches. What’s up? How are we? We doing okay? Now I don’t mean to be an alarmist, but I do believe in being prepared so I want to mention that Mercury will be going retrograde on the 13th of this month. So let’s all try not to allow the stress of that to compound with the stress of the holidays any more than we can help it. Obviously, we are not perfect individuals, but forewarned is forearmed.
So we are going to go into retrograde defense and be conscientious of how we speak to each other and of how we interpret other people’s intentions. We need to protect ourselves and our relationships from any potential fallout that we may experience when the Mercury shit hits the fan. Mercury rules communication and technology, and during retrograde, we can get our wires crossed and we can experience misunderstandings.
We can also experience technological issues, especially communication technology. So emails may be lost in the ether, online ordering can be flukey, phone calls may drop, texts may not go to their intended recipients, and so forth. Not to beat the drum too much, because I feel like I give the same sermon every time Mercury goes retrograde which is like, four times a year. But let’s just give ourselves a better chance to come out of this unscathed.
I also wanted to address a question I received recently and the question was do you think that love spells are ethical. Now, I’ve been asked this several times over the years and my answer is yes, kind of, not really, no. But it depends on the kind of love spell we’re talking about, it depends on the existing relationship that you’re working the spell for, it depends on a few different factors.
I am all for doing love spells in existing relationships to strengthen the communication and the physical connection between two people. I’m all for doing a love spell to encourage a connection that could use a little push. Sometimes two people will dance around their feelings for a while without pursuing it properly and a love spell can help. So can an open conversation, and I think that’s a more effective route to take, but also, why not do both?
I do not advise and would not perform work to break up someone else’s happy relationship. I would not advise or perform work to take someone else’s man. Or woman. If two people are in a good relationship, leave them alone. That’s really shitty. Don’t do that.
But the long and the short of it is that the witch is the one who has to decide the ethics of the work that she or he does. I do not subscribe to the Rule of Three, and I have been very open about the fact that I do throw a hex from time to time, but I do not and will not perform work that is greedy. And by that I mean I won’t perform work with the intent of taking something that belongs to someone else for myself.
I won’t try to take someone’s agency away from them, I sure as hell won’t try to take someone else’s man, and frankly if a love spell is enough to turn a man’s head, he was looking for a reason to be disloyal. And he will not be loyal to you. Sorry to say it, but it’s true.
And the biggest caveat to performing love spells is that your work can give a boost to feelings that already exist, but if you’re performing work to attract someone who would not otherwise be interested in you, and there is no natural attraction or you’re just plain not compatible, your magick will not overcome that. You’ll create an initial spark, get their attention, but you’re not going to create a soulmate from whole cloth.
And with that said, I want to dive right into our topic of discussion which is bone magick. Specifically using bones in magick. And I accept that this practice is not for everyone. This is a divisive topic among the pagan community. Some people find it totally unethical and can not and will not use animal parts in their work.
This is valid. No one should be compelled to do anything that violates their own ethics. But this episode is for folks who are interested and who have no moral or ethical objections. I’ve done plenty of episodes about working with plants, stones, oils, foraged items, and so on. If you’re not interested in using bones in your practice, there are a lot of other ways to get the results you’re looking for without it.
But for those of who are interested, using animal bones, feathers, talons, claws, teeth, horns, and so on are following in the thousands of years of tradition and history that crosses geographical and cultural lines. And that’s where a lot of us find the pull, is in that rich historical tradition of using animal bones in the ways that our ancestors did. We are honoring those traditions, those ancestors, and frankly, we are honoring the animals as well, and I’ll tell you why I think so.
Using animal remains in our practices acknowledges and calls upon the strength and particular attributes of that animal. Rather than wasting these remains, we are applying them in other ways and recognizing the qualities of that animal that we would like to emulate or apply to our workings.
We can eat the flesh of a chicken, but we can also use its eggshells for cleansing or fertility magick, and its bones for healing work. We can use its talons and its beak for protection magick. We can use its feathers for personal power or communication magick. In short, we honor the chicken in many ways in our work, by using all of it. Not just eating our grilled chicken salad and throwing away the rest of the animal.
There are a lot of different ways to acquire animal bones, and bones should always be cleaned and dried before we use them and I went through that whole process in the foraging episode we did a while back, so I’ll link that in the episode description so that if you’re interested, you can go back over all that.
As far as how to use them, they can be used in spell jars or mojo bags, they can be carved with sigils, symbols, or intentions and kept on our altars. Bones can be buried on our property or on someone else’s property depending on the outcome we are trying to achieve. They can be woven into witch’s ladders. They can be fashioned into ritual tools. Small bones can be used for divination, just as we discussed in the Astragalomancy episode. Throwing bones, or bone reading is done with small bones.
Bones can be ground down into bone powder and used in candle spells or spread discreetly somewhere where we don’t want the bone powder to be discovered. This is effective in baneful work, hexes, curses, and protection spells. That’s the purpose of the bone powder that I make and sell in the Etsy shop, but it’s literally just ground up bones. Anyone can make their own.
But I did want to go through some common animals whose bones and remains we might decide to use in different ways. So we already went through a lot of the attributes for chickens and I started there because, I don’t know, chicken bones are probably the easiest to come by. I have so many chicken bones around my house. It’s probably weird how many chicken– actually it’s definitely weird how many chicken bones I’ve got around the house. I’ve got them tied into witch’s ladders, I’ve got a whole jar of wishbones. I like to carve protective sigils into the leg bones. It’s probably, yeah, it’s most definitely abnormal.
Moving on, let’s talk about cat bones. These aren’t going to be very common for most of us, but roadkill is a thing, and again, in the foraging episode we discussed how to safely and hygienically clean and process found remains. Which is a big deal. Let’s be safe. My brother just brought over a cat skull a couple weekends ago, left it in a box on my porch along with a lamb’s jawbone that he found. He’s so supportive of my alternative lifestyle.
Anyway cats are incredibly stealthy and sneaky, so their bones will be great for any work we do that we want to make sure our interference or our own motives remain in the dark. Cats are also bold as hell, they’ll slap the shit out of a pit bull. So spellwork for confidence and power are going to be well supported by the inclusion of cat bones.
Dog bones, good for protection work, also if you’ve cremated your own dog friend, their remains can be added to a pendant and worn for really strong protection magick. Dog bones are good for loyalty magick, any kind of work for your family. Dogs are sacred to Hekate as well, so including dog bones in offerings or as tributes or just keeping them on her altar are going to be well-received.
Frog and toad bones are great for transformative work. Frogs and toads evolve so much during their life cycles, constantly changing and adapting, and so anytime we are working spells to help us to change and adapt and grow to meet new circumstances or to be ready for the next level, that’s where we can use frog and toad bones to great effect.
Snake bones are good for banishing and shedding the old. And of course, it doesn’t have to be bones, we have talked about how we can use old snake skin for that kind of releasing work. When we’re doing shadow work, when we are confronting trauma and pain from the past, snake remains, snake bones make a lot of sense in this kind of work. Because that’s what they do, they go through the hard work and the discomfort of leaving their old image behind. Them in a very literal sense. So we can use their bones in our own work.
Now owl bones, god if we’re fortunate enough to get our hands on owl remains, especially bones, we are going to have a great resource for spiritual work, for work to uncover hidden or secret truths. Owl bones are great for ancestor work, work for and with the dead, prophecy work, divination, shamanic or healing work, and also for receiving visions or wisdom from the spirit world.
Pig bones might not seem like something we would bother with because pigs aren’t given a whole lot of respect which is unfortunate. But if you’re so inclined, I like pig bones for abundance and luck magick.
Porcupines are naturally going to be great for protection magick, and also aggression magick. Bones, for sure, but also porcupine quills. I include porcupine quills in my revenge oil because it’s really effective. That’s the thing about porcupines, isn’t it? If you don’t dick with a porcupine, it’ll leave you alone. But the moment you act a fool, you’re gonna get a quill right in the ass.
And deer bones are great for awareness and clarity spells. If we’re looking for the answers, especially if we need those answers so that we can make a decision, make a big change, make a big move in our lives, deer bones.
Now if you find some random, unidentified bones and you feel like they want to come home with you and work with you but you’re not sure what kind of bones they are, first of all, definitely meditate with them if you like, try and get some insight because that’ll be really helpful, but also, all bones are going to be effective for protection magick. Hanging or burying bones on and around your property is going to work very well. Using them in spell jars, mojo bags, witch ladders, etcetera, gonna be great.
Of course it matters that we treat these remains with respect. Saying a few words of acknowledgement and gratitude for the spirit of the animal is going to be first of all, the right thing to do, the respectful thing, but it’s also going to help our spells. If we’ve explained to the animal how we hope to work with them to create our desired outcome, our results are going to be that much more powerful.
So, just consider it. Think about it, think about how you could use bones in your work and what applications you can think of for it. And of course, as always, be creative. Get weird, get out of the comfort zone. Do witch stuff. And have a lovely weekend. It’s been wonderful talking to you, we’ll do it again next week. My name is Eli Ro, and this has been the Middle-Aged Witch podcast.
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