How I became a witch + harvesting w/ kids

In this episode, I will tell you a bit about how I became a witch,my vacation in Sweden, harvesting with kids, the outcome of one of my Tarot readings, and a cool thing called plantable paper. At the end, I’m going to give you a prompt, something you can do easily and in a short amount of time, to get some magic into your day.

Caution and Disclaimer

A small caution. If you’re sensitive to language, I must warn you that the occasional swear word might slip through the cracks when I edit.

I do not give medical advice
I am not promising a cure for any illness
I am not telling you to replace conventional medication. Remember
that this is about magic and not physics, chemistry or something similar.
Any and all parts that contain information about herbs and remedies is only of historical interest.
Any use of this information is entirely your own responsibility and at your own risk.
I do not guarantee the function of any of the recipes or instructions.

Show Notes

As you may have heard, I was on vacation in Sweden. I went to see some of my relatives; cousins, aunts and uncles, and my mom. We spent some time at the cottage, which is located where my father grew up. I’ve posted about 200 pictures from the vacation on the blog if you want to see them.

How I became a witch

I promised I’d tell you a little about how I ended up being a witch. Sort of the evolution of my path, because there might be some new ones out there who wonder what happens later. The truth is that we continue to evolve. No one is every fully learned or stop at a certain place.

I was born into a family with only one religious person, this was my grandmother on my father’s side, and I never told her about being a witch. As for the others, I don’t care if they know. But out of respect to her, I chose not to maybe upset her by telling her. I was baptized at home by a protestant priest, because of tradition, I also went through a Christian confirmation because of tradition, and because there was no real alternative.

The real story began back in the early 90’s with me researching herbal medicine. I was first and foremost interested in painkillers, as I couldn’t afford conventional medicine. One day I stumbled upon an old black book. I don’t mean a book from the 60’s, I mean one from the 1400’s. This book intrigued me to the level where I started looking for more. Fortunately, I lived in Sweden at the time, where they’ve preserved a lot of those books, and the library in the city where I lived had about 20 of them. Needless to say, I read each and every one from start to finish. This is how I found out that I was a witch. Harry Potter was years into the future, and I’d never heard of others like me. So I wasn’t approaching the subject because of popularity.

After working and researching on my own for 9 years, I stumbled across a pagan forum on the Internet. That was a real revelation for me. There were others like me! I soon found out the Wicca wasn’t for me, and I settled on being an eclectic witch without working with deities. I called myself Pagan, Witch, and maybe going so far as Hedge Witch. I was, in fact, dead set against working with a pantheon. This has since changed.

In 2003, I dedicated myself to the Heathen, Fornsiðr, or Asatru. It all depends on what you prefer to call it. I did this after a long period of soul-searching. The ways of the Norse have intrigued me since I was a child, so it felt natural that I choose the old ways of my people. Not only because of my early interest in the Norse people. but also because this is where I was born and grew up, and this is where my family has always lived. (But I’m not folkish. I believe anyone can find this path, regardless of heritage.) In 2010, I joined The Asatru fellowship Bifrost. Not only to pledge my allegiance to the path but also to prevent a Christian burial for myself, which my dad was forced to have because my Mom didn’t have the money to be able to choose.

The last few years, I’ve been calling myself Heathen and Witch. And I find myself drifting towards the role of the wise woman. Working more with nature spirits, and what you can get from Nature, than gods and goddesses. It surprised me that my path would uproot itself this late, but since I’ve read quite a bit on Paganism, I know it’s pretty common to continue to evolve.

For the last five years, I’ve intensified my research into the subjects of wights, elves, other nature spirits, Seiðr and Galðr, plus a couple of non-related female deities. Both the myths, the anthropology, and the archaeology. I’ve read every scientific report I could get my hands on about the subject of Seidhr, and asked just about every heathen I know for info. I’ve also read a number of Scandinavian books, and a few of the American books, although I feel many American authors twist and mix up the info that’s available.

One of the women in my blotslag, who knows a fair bit about Seiðr, agreed to talk to me about it and we had an interesting conversation. I’ve talked to Lilleulv at Hedningene.dk, and I’ve gotten some info from brainwise on Twitter. I’ve also talked to our hovgydje, Rig Svenson, Lorrie Wood, Diana Paxson and Yngona Desmond. All have been very nice to me and answered a lot of my questions. I learned a lot from the group Seiðr session with Einar Selvik from Wardruna as well. I feel most of my learning has come from the actual practice; My own journeys to the other realms.

I’ve been offering my services as a witch since I started, more or less. So it’s not something that’s new to me. But I’ve been starting to come back to doing more of the witchy services, so I’ve added the services to my Witch’s Library because that’s where people who are interested end up. That’s also why I added this podcast to that site.

If you want to know anything more about me, my path or what I do. Or if you want to learn something about the subjects I’ve been mentioning, just look me up on social media or send me an email. I’d be happy to answer your questions.

A reading about a property

One of the readings I’ve done, and this was a rune reading, was about the location and financing of a property. This was for a woman I know, and she was looking for where she should be looking for this home. Where she could find this perfect place. The runes I pulled for her ended up showing that she’s heading into the countryside. I was getting relations to cattle and horses.

Other things that came up were hunting, forestry and land. So perhaps the area was large enough to have hunting rights, event if she would choose not to make use of them. The runes said it might take a bit longer than she first thought before she’s able to realize this. She’ll be needing money, and that was no surprise.

She also asked what the wights might want as an offering, and I said that they might want something from the mineral kingdom.

This was a couple of years ago, and she now has a property in the country with a forest around it, and she’s rebuilding the house on the property to be self-sufficient in regard to everything. She’s not hooked up to electricity or plumbing, she’s going 100 % natural.

So I’m glad to say that the reading seemed to be very accurate for her, and I’m glad I got to see the results too. I don’t often get to see the end results after a reading. It’s been fun, and I’ve seen pictures too. It’s a pretty place.

If you’d like a reading yourself, I’ve added the readings to The Witch’s Library. Just go to lindaursin.net/library and you’ll find them on the front page. I also have a new freebie. If you subscribe to my newsletter, I’ll give you 50 % off your first reading, but you’ll have to ask me for the link for that one because I haven’t been able to set it up today. I’ll be setting it up tomorrow.

Harvesting with kids

A question for you: Would you harvest herbs with your children?

I’ve harvested with my daughter on more than one occasion, and I’m going to do it again this year. I think it’s a great way to teach kids about the herbs that are available in the area where you live, and also teach them how to harvest. When what herb is in season, what it can be used for, which part to harvest, and not to waste or damage the plants so they can keep growing.

Of course, I wouldn’t have her harvest anything that might be harmful to her, but I hardly use any poisonous or hazardous plants anyway. So that’s easy for me. Lilith seems to really enjoy taking herb walks with me, and I hope what I’m teaching her will stick and that she’ll use it when she gets older.

Do you teach your kids about Nature? Comment and let me know how you do it.

Plantable Paper

I have a little cool product that I came across. I was actually tipped off about this link, and it’s http://www.custommade.com/blog/plantable-paper/.

It means that you can use packaging whether it’s a coffee cup, stationary, wrapping paper, gift cards, boxes, and plant them afterwards. There are seeds embedded in the paper.

You can use these for guerilla planting if you like. They can also transform the way people think about trash. I think it’s a really cool product. I was happy to see it. It sort of goes along the line with the biodegradable urn, where you can be planted after you’ve been cremated. I thought that one was a good one too.

Today’s prompt: The prompt for today is to get into your cabinets and check what you have available. Go through your culinary herbs, your spices, and find out more about them. See what you can use them for.

That’s it for me for today. Thanks for listening to the Witch in the Valley Podcast. The next episode will, among other things, be about familiars. If you have any questions, just reach out to me at linda@lindaursin.net Remember to rate and subscribe to the podcast on iTunes.

(This podcast will be published on iTunes after 5-6 episodes.)