Everyone has the potential to be a witch. Everyone has the potential to be a warrior. For too long witches have been labelled evil if they fought back; indoctrinated to fear our power. The time for doubt is over. It is time to fight.

I, the bone witch, need you: the witches, the women, the down trod, the homosexuals, the misunderstood, the misfits—anyone who is different and bold, anyone non-white and CIS, I need you to understand your power even if you don’t believe in mine. If you are different in any way, history has hunted and burned you in the name of witch. But the era of fear is over. The warrior energy is just as much your right to claim as any witch.

The world is under threat, people are dying every day for the values that keep us human, for the things that witches hold divine. Some of them are dying for no reason at all. We have witches being hunted in Ghana. We have women and children being tortured and killed by the thousands in Afghanistan, North Korea, Syria, Yemen, the Congo etc. Our elderly and our veterans are being left to die on the streets of America. Hell, let’s not mince words, America is leading the developed world in terms of committing atrocious human rights abuses. People are starving to death in Haiti, Zambia, and Sudan. We have refugees walking themselves to death seeking safe harbor the world over. The human will to power has grown corrupt and sick. It’s quite possible that the evolving structures of power will be communist dictatorships putting everyone I have just listed, and more, at risk of death. We, the witches, need to not only know how to fight for ourselves but also to fight for those we serve: the meek, the weak, and the broken.

I need you to know that we all can fight. For too long we have been preached to about white magick, safe magick, shadow magick, green magick, high magick, base magick, evil magick, space magick etc. At its core, all magick is the same. We must unite. We must learn how to fight. Our history is a bloody one. It is getting better but there will be more blood.

Reclaiming our wild is not worth a dime if we are going to shun our warrior.

Witches have the fury and fight of The Great Mother. Take a moment to feel what a mother would if her children were taken from her. There is no greater rage. There is nothing, nothing a mother would not do to protect her children. That rage is ours. Women are the ultimate warriors not because we have strength, but because we have the will. Purpose trumps force every time. We are made in the image of the Great Mother, the seat of all creation and destruction. We should honour her. We are her warriors.

Magick is a defensive art. The aim is to prevent and defend against danger. But sometimes the fight comes to you and you have to go on the offensive. Some witches can fight physically, others do it magickally. We need both kinds of warriors. And to defend and fight, both kinds of warriors need will and intuition.

Witchcraft is known for its plethora of curios and regalia. While these are pretty, magick doesn’t need any external objects. Magick is an ephemeral force and responds to the same. If you are bound and burning on pyre, do you really think the spirits will ignore you for not having the right herbs or a white knife? The Universe only needs you to own and use your will and your intuition to make magick happen. The time for doubt is over. You either believe in yourself, or you don’t. Self-belief is a work in progress just like most aspects of the self, but in the moment when it’s down to you and them, you either believe or you don’t. So, start working on yourself because in the end you just need to believe more than the your oppressor.

Will is your absolute core of pure power. It is what your soul shines with. You alone can draw from and direct your will. Your will is what you push out into the Universe to change things. This is your most precious gift, and this is why witches are so protective of their freedom.

Intuition is how we communicate with the Universe. Humans are wonderfully curious, intelligent, and creative, but we still know next to nothing about the human mind. We only know fractionally more about language. Complex and symbolic language is the one thing that sets us apart from other species. It ensured the survival of our species. However, we are not the only ones who communicate, and that communication is not limited to speech. Plants and animals have means of communication that we are only just beginning understand.

The Universe is in constant communication with us. All we have to do is listen. All we have to do is speak up.

Intuition, knowings, sendings, visions, prophecies, dreams etc., also largely confound scientific scrutiny. But science agrees that humans have mastered intuition (and what we know of it) to benefit our survival. When our ancestors were out hunting they would have relied on intuition. For example, a powerful tool would have been the sense of hairs rising on the back of your neck when you are being watched or danger is nearby. That same sense can tell us if a house is haunted, or if someone is to be trusted, or if a situation is dangerous. Intuition can tell us someone has died. It can bring messages from the other side, or show us the face of our future lover in our dreams. Intuition can be as simple as knowing a friend is going to call minutes before the phone rings, or as complex as talking to our ancestors under the light of the full moon.

A witch’s core power is the ability to use and work with their will and intuition. Intuition is the left fist, will is the right fist. Intuition tells us what we need and how to work with the Universe to effect change. Intuition can also tell you if it safe to cast or not. Once you are settled and safe, you can use your words, motions, visualizations etc., to punch change into the fabric of the Universe. If you have listened correctly to your intuition, the change will happen seamlessly. No big glaring differences, just another thread being quietly woven into the tapestry of this reality.

I need you to know how to use your will and intuition. Together, will and intuition are the core of what make things happen in regular life and magickal life, and whether they are used for simple creation or defense. I need you to know that using will and intuition is not evil.

There is no negative or positive magick. All ‘magick’ is neutral, just like an inert fist; powerful but useless until someone exerts their will on it. So, why have we been told that we can only use the left fist? Or better yet, no fists at all? Why is it that anything that involves fighting back or getting our hands bloody, despite a history of our blood being spilled, is evil?

If we keep telling witches they must only heal and never harm, we are shooting our cause in the foot. The path of witchcraft actually closely models the medical profession in terms of goals and tools. If we are to understand that, then we have to understand that in order to heal and keep people safe, sometimes you have to harm. Sometimes you need to break a bone to reset it. Sometimes you have to amputate, restrain, or even let go. And sometimes you have to have a patient removed and imprisoned before they hurt themselves or anyone else. The world is wonderful but not always kind. You cannot expect to be an effective witch if you only operate with one fist, or reject the warrior within.

Witches have been told for too long they have to be good. Good witches are indeed the ideal, but there will be no ‘good’ witches if they don’t know how to protect themselves when the danger comes. A good witch can also be a warrior witch. Can’t you see the institutional ludicrousness of telling one of the most persecuted groups in history that it is not okay to fight back? That their particular brand of self-defense tools is evil? Witches are being allowed to exist, as long as they stay in their safe little boxes prescribed by society. You can be a witch, so long as you’re a white witch, and God forbid you mention the Horned One.

We are powerful warriors. Hexing and cursing hobbles the enemy. Binding stops the enemy’s actions. Masters of the left-hand path can drain an enemy of their energy and aide escape. Doulas effect safe passage to and from the Otherworld. Shamans can shield and hide victims from pursuers. And those witches who work with Enochian magick are the SWAT team of the craft. There is so, so much more we have to learn about the warrior witch’s arsenal. And yet, somehow, large portions of the community have been programmed to consider this defensive magick as evil and the witches who engage in such activities as evil.

I know evil. I have come face to face with it thrice. A witch practicing defensive magick, or a warrior-witch fighting for theirs or others’ lives, is not even close to evil. If anything, they are the opposite.

If we keep labeling warrior witches as evil, we are going to lose the skills and tools to fight back. We have already lost so, so much magick and wisdom because of persecution and fear of our own kind and power. We need to transcend this ignorance and fear.

So listen to me now, you have the power, you are witch, you are good, you are warrior, you are allowed needed to fight. There is no room for doubt. Own and trust in your will and your intuition. Feel the rage of The Great Mother. Fight for what you know is right. Fight for us. We will fight for you.

I promise you that you are not evil, you are warrior and you are righteous.

When someone asks you if it okay to punch a Nazi, the answer is always yes. When someone asks you if it is okay to hex Trump, the answer is always yes. Fighting the good fight using the tools of the witch is not evil, it is good, and necessary.

I’ll be running classes on the Warrior Witch: learning to listen to and trust your intuition and wield your will. I will make them as accessible as possible and provide group and one-on-one face time for each participant. Follow me on Instagram @weavertarot for the upcoming Warrior Witch: Will and Intuition TM classes.