Consent and intent - pt 2

Next steps on working with plant allies

Golly - this has been a long time coming. Since my last post a lot has happened - covid and major surgery to name but two of the things. I’m finally feeling well enough to get back to writing, though I can’t promise I’ll ever be one of those weekly posters, despite my annoying tendency toward aspirational thinking.

We recently covered the very early stages of connecting with plant allies - went over some basic exercises for flexing those intuitive communication muscles, with encouragement to get out there and try and bond with local plants as often as possible.

This time I want to get deeper into how I use this on an every day, practical level, and provide some templates to use or adapt as desired.

As always - this is my personal practice and it is not meant to be prescriptive - you may have a way that works for you that differs wildly.

Which plants to use and when to pick them

While I would love to have a garden and an associated apothecary cabinet of herbs and materia, I live in a tiny one bed flat and as I work full time I can’t always go plant hunting when needed. Space, both physical and mental, is limited. As such my approach is a little unconventional.

Now, I adore planetary magic and I do use the days of the week and their planetary associations as the stationary, warp yarns on my magical loom (spirit work is the weft I think…let me contemplate this metaphor a little more before I commit to it).

However, while you can buy and store herbs in jars to use at appropriate times, once picked plants lose their magical potency pretty fast. Add into that not knowing their provenance, storage history etc, and I very much prefer to pick my own and use them fresh where possible. I would also warn against using dried commercial florist flowers for magical purposes - they have often been treated with pesticides, fungicides, insecticides and bleach. Not substances conducive to magic.

While I do have small stashes of certain items tucked away for the Winter months, the rest of the year I just go outside and see what calls to me, planetary associations be damned. I live life on the edge, me.

I usually start this process by deciding what the work I want to do is, and what day I would like to perform it; Thursday ruled by Jupiter for works of increase, health and wealth etc.

Ideally you would pick your herbs on the relevant planetary day and hour and within the relevant moon phase (waxing for flowers and leaves, waning for roots), and if I can pick my herbs on the relevant day, I will. If this is not possible then my second choice is a Wednesday, in my opinion any magic can be done on a Wednesday as that day belongs to magic itself. Magical needs don’t always allow us the luxury of time however, so often I will just go out on any day at a convenient hour and see what I can find.

Having decided I want to do some money magic, I will then set a very clear intent with myself and my spirit colleagues, to find appropriate materia on my walk. This will usually take the form of a spoken request to allies and ancestors to guide me toward the things I need - mine is a hodge-podge of Jason Miller and Aidan Wachter’s work.

I call upon my allies all:
Ancestors, angels, daimons, spirits of all kinds,
Those who aid and guard me,
Those who nourish and protect me,
Assist me in finding materia suitable for [insert purpose]
Thank you for your guidance, in this, as in all things.

I’ll then take a walk - either intuitively finding a route - or occasionally I’ll employ the Randonautica app to take me where it will. On the way I’ll look and see which plants and other materia call out to me. I might pick up coins, stones, a snail shell etc, and any plants that feel right. On a typical walk I’ll come across things like lavender and rosemary in public planters. At the end of my road is a periwinkle that aggressively flaunts her blooms at me and who features in a lot of my workings.

Plant ID apps are very useful if you find something unfamiliar - I always use two however, as they can get identification wrong and noone wants to accidentally pick poison hemlock instead of healing yarrow. If you aren’t completely sure what something is - don’t pick it, don’t use it.

As you increase your knowledge of herbs and their properties you’ll soon build up associations for the plants in your area. Plants communicate with us in many ways - their appearance and smell being the easiest to read. For me lavender is a herb of love, it’s sweet smell marks it out as a plant of attraction and the purple flowers speak of harmony. Rosemary also smells sweet but has an astringency - it is a herb of cleansing and it’s slightly spiky shape tells me it is useful in works of protection. These correspondences are based on the idea of the Doctrine of Signatures in herbalism and I’ll write about that more in a coming post.

You may find it useful to keep a map of the locations where you find more interesting things - I have a little notebook where I record locations and uses of the various herbs I find.

As I go I will pick a small amount of each herb, in the most respectful way I can - asking permission, and so we move on to consent - which can be a multilayered process.

A digression on the nature of plant spirits

In my previous post I discussed how I consider plants to have a spirit. How this expresses itself to me is a complex thing. In my experience there is a spirit unique to the individual plant, but also a greater one united across the species. You could consider this greater plant spirit the plant ‘Genius’.

So while the mugwort in your grandmother’s garden and that growing in your local park are a long distance from each other, they are have similarities of character and an ability to communicate across their species despite being physically unconnected.

There is also a very strong link between the spirits of place and the spirits of the plants in a place, almost as if the spirits of the place itself oversee the plants within their borders. The easiest way to illustrate this is with graveyard work. If you want to harvest plants or take earth from a graveyard, you would ask both the spirits of the graveyard itself and of the grave you are harvesting from. The same applies to places like parks, gardens etc. The whole process is made easier by propitiating the spirit of the park itself first, and then speaking to the plant.

How to harvest, respectfully and responsibly

As mentioned above - this is about asking for and obtaining permission.

I will usually start by asking the spirits of place for permission to harvest there and making an offering, usually water poured on the ground or energy. I have never had a negative response to this so don’t worry about not feeling anything - unless you are actively chased out of the space by a sudden change in weather or a particular angry wasp I’d say you are good to go. My current request format is below.

Spirits of this place
I am [name], witch and student of plant magic
I have come here today to ask you permission to harvest herbs for the purposes of XXXX
In return I offer you this offering of fresh water
*pour water on ground and stay silent for about a minute to see if any messages come through*
Thank you Spirits of place, I appreciate your permission.

I would then very gently touch the plant and ask it for permission to pick what I need and also advise it why I am picking it. This is where intent comes in again - you are informing the plant spirit of what you plan to do with it, which helps the plant to amplify that quality in what you harvest. Try it when picking berries - when you tell the plant its fruit is delicious and you wish it to nourish you, you’ll find your food tastes sweeter.

The below prayer is a combination of a piece from the PGM which I first encountered in Jack Grayle’s class and which is featured in Schulke’s ‘13 Pathways’, and a passage from ‘Magical Herbalism’ by Scott Cunningham. It acknowledges the plant spirit and calls forth the attributes required.

Note - the PGM suggests fasting for a few hours and following a ritual of self cleansing before cutting any plants. I have not found this makes a lot of difference - but then I usually pick at lunchtime anyway so have naturally not eaten for a few hours.

I, [name] witch of [location or other identifier you use] have come to pick you, [name of plant], with my own hands
I ask you to help me with your unfailing virtues [list if you know them]
I ask you to work with me toward a certain purpose
I cut you [name of plant] so that [insert what you will use plant for]
I ask you by the powers of Hekate and Pan [use whichever gods you prefer] to fulfil for me the perfect charm
In exchange I offer you this fresh water 

*pour water*
*touch the plant and use all your senses to receive a response*

Thank you - May our relationship ever deepen and ever be fruitful

Provided you feel like you have received consent then you will want to pick what you need, and only what you need. Just like any foraging, try to not overpick from one plant when you could just take a little from several. Given what I mentioned about plant spirits earlier - if you have approval from one you can generally assume the other plants of the same type around also consent.

I prefer to use a pair of scissors I have consecrated for this task and this task only and which I keep clean between uses by wiping with alcohol. This helps prevent the plants being exposed to any diseases and provides a cleaner cut than picking with fingers does, though I do use my hands on the occasions I don’t have scissors.

On the recommendation of Scott Cunningham’s wonderful book ‘Magical Herbalism’, I plan to switch from stainless steel scissors to copper, brass or stone blades. Using something containing iron is not ideal for spirit work, but for now I am doing my best - brass bladed scissors are hard to find!

Once you have finished collecting - say thank you to the spirits of place once more.

Summary:

So - to summarise:

• decide what you want to do magic for and when is the optimum time to harvest

• go out to pick - whether it be to somewhere known or a random picking walk - ask your spirit team for help in finding what you need

• when you find something you want speak to the spirits of the place and the plant to explain what you want and why you want it

• wait for a response

• if yes - pick gently and carefully, ideally with scissors or secateurs

• give thanks and an offering of water, energy etc

Conclusion

I hope this helps give an idea of how I do this, I’d love to hear how others do similar work. I’ll be back soon with a post about the Doctrine of Signatures, and some ideas on what you can do with your materia once gathered.

References:

Cunningham, Scott, ‘Magical Herbalism’

Miller, Jason, ‘Sorcerors Secrets’

Roth, Harold, ‘The Witching Herbs’

Schulke, Daniel, ‘Ars Philtron’

Schulke, Daniel, ‘13 Pathways to Occult Herbalism’

Wachter, Aidan, ‘Six Ways’