What is "Magic(k)"?

Everyone on here is talkign about it... but what does it mean? What does it involve? Please feel free to post your meanings, experiences, examples and thoughts here. =)

[norseman]

Magic is the channeling and direction of natural energies by the will of the practitioner.
Forget about white, black, etc magic - there is only magic which may be used for light or dark purposes. The path I follow is a "crooked" path - it veers from light to dark.
Let me stress one more time. "Magic" is not supernatural, it is of the Earth, and what people refer to as magic are skills which we had in previous times.

Magick (spelled with a "k" to differentiate it from stage magic - card tricks, pulling rabbits out of hats), is raising natural psychic energy, and using it to make a change in things. As in casting spells, that sort of thing.

I think my one big success with magick was a protection spell/shield I had placed on my house and property in 2005. I had some really nasty neighbors next door. I had bought from Mystic Trader- an online metaphysical business- a decoration - he is a like a skeleton - with outspread wings - and sunken eyes. I painted his eyes with glitter red nail polish. I worked for about 3 months, charging this guy with my energy for protection. When I was ready - one afternoon, I smudged my house with sage, and cast my circle - I expanded my circle into a protective bubble which I mentally visualized as encircling my entire property - driveway, back yard, etc. Then I hung my talisman on my porch with my windchimes. I had him facing the house next door. This was around 4pm. A little after 6pm, I was going to take a nap before work and had just laid down on my couch. My hubby was cooking dinner. We heard what we thought was some idiot setting off a whole pack of firecrackers on our front lawn. Nope - the teenagers next door had gotten some druggies mad at them. They were on their porch and was able to see what was coming and ran in the house. Two guys came out from between 2 house kitty-cornered across the street and just sprayed from right to left - and my house was in direct line of fire! Shell casing were on the street and sidewalk in front of my house, in the bottom of my driveway. The gutter pipe of the house next door was shot up - just feet from the windshield of my van. A house two doors down got hit. And unfortunatly, so did an innocent guy walking down the street, and he got hit right in front of my house and collapsed thirty feet away.
The police were shocked - not one bullet hit my house or my van. My husband said it was like a shield was over our house - there was - because I put it there.

That's just one example of what putting natural psychic energies to use can do - and it's the perhaps the best thing and first thing one should do - because if you do regular psychic energy cleansings and protection spells, it eliminates the need for other banishing spells - you've warded them off already!

So, you're saying that the term "supernatural" is jsut given to somethingthat is actualyl just natural, norseman? Hm.. Like, the "supernatural" stuff in books and on t.v. is just not possible right?

Wow Lady Moondancer. That sounds truly amazing. I wish I could do something like that myself!

[norseman]

"supernatural" is a word used when people do not understand something.
BUT for all that being natural does not mean it is without hazard to the uninformed.
Koko, it does take a long, long time to become adept.
I do not work with people, my magic is purely Earth magic.

[Silver]

Norsie, can you give us a simple (?) example of what it means to do Earth magic?

[norseman]

Originally Posted by Silvergirl

Norsie, can you give us a simple (?) example of what it means to do Earth magic?

Rituals at places of Power to promote healing. Striding the hedge is another good example. On a basic level, Earth magic could be considered as conservation work.

[Silver]

Originally Posted by norseman

Rituals at places of Power to promote healing. Striding the hedge is another good example. On a basic level, Earth magic could be considered as conservation work.

I've heard you mention striding the hedge, but what exactly does it mean, what does it do, how does it work? Thx.

[norseman]

"Striding the hedge" is a phrase that originates in medieval or even earlier times in Britain especially. Hedges - narrow strips of planting of hawthorn and the like - were used to define my land from yours, our village from the wild untamed land, wheat fields from pasture, etc. They were also used as a source of food by both humans and animals with many berry bushes planted and herbs, they were safe paths for small mammals, and nesting places for birds.
It came to mean much more than that in the time of the mystical Celts - the "hedge" was used to describe any boundary, a place between places, a time between times. For example - the strand of beach exposed between high and low tides [careful with that one ! ], dusk or dawn or midnight, a cave, a change of seasons or the first day of a New Year [we just had one of those in Samhain]. Such places have to be treated with caution as it is possible to pass between Realms of Being - from our mundane world to the spirit world.
So striding the hedge is being part of both worlds at the same time, having one foot in each. This is not simple magic, neither is it without risk.
So why do it ? - mainly to seek advice from the ancestors, to seek their aid in promoting healing of the Land.
"Striding the hedge" aka "Crossing the Veil"

[norseman]

Just an afterthought, my part of the world the fields were divided up by dry-stone walls rather than green hedges, some of which are at least a thousand years old. In this case, things like stiles become mystic objects

Dales fields and walls, many of them built by Viking settlers.