Most descriptions of magickal altars describe what goes on them. They advise that you use a box, a small table, or just about anything, then cover it with a cloth and put all of your ritual items on it. The ceremonial magick altar is different. Often, it will have no cloth cover at all. The design and shape of the altar, however, is fairly specific. Let's look at why: It is a double cube. The reason for this is simple. When you form a magickal circle, you literally become a small version of the universe within the circle. The two cubes represent all things: the smaller (microcosm) and the greater (macrocosm). They also remind us of the principle, "as above, so below." What we

This week, to help prepare for Ostara festivities on the weekend, we have a guest blogger stepping in! Bronwynn Forrest Torgerson, author of One Witch's Way: A Magical Year of Stories, Spells & Such, writes about the beautiful magic of nature on the spring equinox. Enjoy! When did our blessed Ostara get to be such a juvenile holiday?  I recall being new to the Craft but long attuned to the seasons and cycles of the earth, and smelling the first breath of Spring in the air.  There was a subtle shifting of energies, an inward stirring of freshness, possibility and new hope in the air.  As a wilderness child, I avidly searched for the first hint that the cold earth had thawed, for

Over at the Aeclectic Tarot forum, there was a conversation about shuffling. Well, it started off as about asking the question, but wandered over into shuffling. Shuffling is something those of us who have been doing it forever don't really think about. But those who are new to tarot sometimes have concerns about doing everything just right. They have an idea that tarot is this magic formula that unless you do everything just so, then it won't work. There may be tarot readers who believe that. However, among my tarot friends and colleagues, the common belief is that there is no magic formula and that every practitioner has their own methods. I like the idea of making the shuffling