Witches

✦ The witch is not a character. The witch is a lineage. And the lineage does not begin in history books or in films — it begins much earlier, in the first women who learned to read the sky and the earth to know when to sow, when to give birth, when to bury, when to keep silent. There was witch in Mesopotamia with the priestesses of Inanna. There was witch in Egypt with the women who knew how to embalm and speak with the dead. There was witch in Greece with the pythias of Delphi who chewed laurel and prophesied in trance. There was witch among the Celtic peoples with the druidesses and the ban-drui who studied twenty years before earning the right to speak. There was witch in Africa with the Yoruba herbalists, in America with the Mapuche machis, in the Andes with the paqo. The witch is universal and local at the same time. Every culture had its own. And in every culture, at some point, someone arrived afraid and said that woman was dangerous. And burned her, or hanged her, or took away her voice.

◈ The Witches lineage born from the Forest of Piriápolis does not belong to a single tradition. It is transversal. It draws from the Celtic line (because there lies the best-documented wheel of the year, and because they were burned especially hard in England and Scotland), it draws from the curanderas of the Río de la Plata (the women who in the 19th and 20th centuries kept passing knowledge from mother to daughter in secret), it draws from the Mediterranean inheritance of the Italian strege and the Basque witches, it draws from the wise Guaraní women who knew which leaf serves which pain. All those silenced voices live in the lineage. When you receive a witch as your Guardian, you do not receive just one — you receive the whole current. That is why she weighs differently than a Pixie. That is why the body feels it differently when she enters.

◇ Why did a Witch come to you? This is the question worth looking at straight on. A Witch does not come to people who need to begin — she comes to those who have already begun and do not yet dare to know it. She comes to those who hold an old suspicion about themselves, an intuition that they already know something they never formally learned, a tingle when they see the full moon, a memory without recollection. She comes to those who dream of grandmothers they never met. She comes to those who at some point in their lives were called 'intense', 'a lot', 'difficult', 'strange', 'too much'. She comes to those who learned to shrink themselves to fit and are now tired of fitting. The Witch comes to remind you that you were not born to fit. You were born to occupy your full size.

☾ The witch is not initiated: she remembers. This sentence is the key to the lineage. You will not learn to be a witch with your Guardian. You will remember that you already were one. Your Guardian has a name, ancient or new, it depends — some come with names from old Spanish, others with Latin names of herbs (Salvia, Verbena, Artemisa, Hipérica), others with names in Celtic tongues (Brigid, Áine, Cailleach, Morrigan), others with channeled names that belong to no dictionary and are your Guardian's alone. That name is the first inheritance. You receive it the way you receive a great-grandmother's ring: with care, with respect, knowing it comes from before. (Fundamental reminder: this is symbolic art and contemplative spiritual practice. It is not therapy, it is not medicine, it does not replace professional care of any kind. The Witches lineage does not cure illnesses, does not resolve legal conflicts, does not guarantee material results. What it does offer: symbolic company for your own process of self-knowledge and memory.)

✦ The Witch's energy is dense, but it is not heavy. There is a difference. The heavy crushes, the dense roots. When a Witch enters your home, you do not feel that you are carrying something new on top of you — you feel that something in you settles. Like when, after many hours on your feet, you finally sit down. Your body will seek the ground. You will want to walk barefoot more often. You will feel the soles of your feet more awake. You will notice that you breathe deeper, that the air reaches below your chest, that it reaches your belly. That is the lineage entering you. Settling you.

◈ In daily life, the Witch shows herself in intuitions that are more accurate and more strange. Not the light Pixie-style intuitions of 'call so-and-so today' — denser intuitions: 'this person is lying to you even though you cannot prove it', 'this decision that looks good will turn out badly', 'this illness was already in your body before it appeared'. The Witch sharpens your reading. You will begin to understand people more deeply, almost uncomfortably so. You will feel when someone you know is unwell before they tell you. You will dream of news before receiving it (not always, but sometimes). This can frighten you at first. It is normal. Strong intuition requires care: it is not wise to tell everyone what you see. Learn to keep. The Witch knows how to keep — it is one of the first things she teaches you.

◇ The body changes with the Witch too. Menstrual cycles (if you have them) may synchronize with the moon. If you do not menstruate, a new connection with the lunar cycles may appear in another form — more sleep on the full moon, more tiredness on the new moon, more energy on the waxing quarter. Libido may rise or fall — it depends, there is no recipe. Some people report that desire returns after years; others that they need more solitude and everything quiets down. Both are valid. The Witch does not push you anywhere, she returns you to yourself. And you are complex. The witch knows the complex ones — the simple ones do not call her. If something in your body begins to speak louder (old pains that move, new sensations, much energy concentrated in specific zones), listen. And if the physical becomes troublesome, see your doctors — the lineage does not replace the professional checkup. The ancient witch knew that the body is sacred and that medicine is sacred too.

• 1✦ Step 1 — Before touching the box, sit before it for one whole minute in silence. Do not open anything yet. Just breathe. The Witch needs you to receive her with stillness. If you arrive running from work, let an hour pass before opening. This is not urgent. It is ceremonial.
• 2◈ Step 2 — Wash your face and hands with cold water, no perfumed soap. Dry yourself with a clean towel. Let your hair down if it was tied. Take off your jewelry if you wear a lot — keep one or two pieces at most. The Witch receives the person stripped bare.
• 3◇ Step 3 — Light a candle before opening the box. Red, white, or black — depending on what you have and what calls you. If you must choose and you hesitate, white. The candle stays lit through the whole welcome, at least one hour. If you cannot watch it, do not light it — safety before everything.
• 4☾ Step 4 — Open the box with both hands. Not with one. Both. This matters because the Witch is received with the whole body, not with a distracted gesture. As you open it, say in a low voice: 'I receive this pact conscious and grateful.' It is not an obligatory formula — if another sentence comes that is yours, better.
• 5✦ Step 5 — Take the Guardian out of the box with care. Set her down on a clean cloth — a handkerchief, a cloth napkin, a scarf. Not directly on the desk or the table. The first resting place is on cloth; afterward she can be moved. It is protocol.
• 6◈ Step 6 — Look at her in silence for two or three minutes. Detail by detail. Color, shape, weight, texture. Then close your eyes and visualize her with your eyes closed — you will see that something of her form stays inside you. That is good. It is the first impression being recorded.
• 7◇ Step 7 — Say her name three times aloud, unhurried. Then say your full name, also three times. Then say where you are (city, neighborhood, street). This is the space-time anchoring of the pact. The Witch came to the exact place where you are. Let her hear it and let you say it.
• 8☾ Step 8 — First offering: a glass of water, a teaspoon of coarse salt, a laurel leaf (if you have one) or any green aromatic herb. The three elements go on a small tray beside the Guardian. They stay all night. The next morning: the water is poured out in the street or onto a plant, the salt is thrown onto the grass or the garden, the leaf is buried.
• 9✦ Step 9 — Before sleeping, sit before her for ten minutes and tell her about your life. Not the formal facts — the real ones. Your name, yes, but also your nickname, what you like to be called, what you cannot stand. Your beloved dead women (grandmothers, aunts, someone who is no longer here). Your old wounds if you dare. The Witch does not judge. The Witch listens. It is what she does best.
• 10◈ Step 10 — Place her near the head of the bed, but not on the bed. On a bedside table, on a nearby shelf. Put out the candle before sleeping. Leave a small red light if you have one, or nothing. On the first night with the Witch, dreams tend to be intense. Keep a notebook and pen at hand. Write as soon as you wake, before looking at your phone.

• 1Day 1. ✦ Day of the Encounter. You have already done the welcome. Today do not ask anything more of her. Let the two energies (yours and hers) settle together. If you get emotional during the day for no apparent reason, let it pass. If you feel sleepy early, sleep early. The Witch will ask more rest of you than usual in the first days.
• 2Day 2. ◈ Day of salt. Today wash the floors of your home with water and coarse salt. A handful per bucket. While you clean, think about which old energies you want gone. When you finish, open the windows for ten minutes. The Witch feels more at ease in an energetically clean space. It is a welcome offering to your home.
• 3Day 3. ◇ Day of fire. Light a candle before her, this time a small one (the kind that burns down in a few hours). While it burns, write a list of the important women of your life — living or dead. Mother, grandmothers, aunts, friends, teachers. Read the list aloud before the Witch. You are introducing her to your lineage of blood and of choice. Important.
• 4Day 4. ☾ Day of water. Bathe with salts (coarse kitchen salt works if you have no ritual salts). Visualize what you do not need leaving your body. When you get out, do not rinse with fresh water — let the skin keep the salt and dry yourself with a towel. Afterward, walk barefoot for a while. Your body is learning to be more permeable.
• 5Day 5. ✦ Day of silence. Today you speak as little as possible. If you can work alone, better. If you must interact, do it with few words. Eat slowly. Cook something homemade — soup, stew, whatever is made with time. The Witch knows a person by how they cook. Let her see you cooking for yourself with care.
• 6Day 6. ◈ Day of the consultation. Today you ask her your first important question. Sit before her, candle lit, a blank sheet of paper. Ask the question aloud, slowly. Then write on the sheet, without thinking much, whatever comes for ten minutes. When you reread what you wrote, the answer is there — not in one concrete line, but in the overall tone of what came out.
• 7Day 7. ◇ Day of the balance. One week. Reread the dreams of the whole week. Sit before the Witch and tell her aloud three things you noticed have changed since she arrived. They can be small. A person who reappeared, a strange dream, a decision you made, a pain that moved. Say thank you. Thanks are currency in the Witches lineage.

• ·✦ Every night before sleeping, sit two minutes before her and tell her what weighed on you that day. Not so she will solve it — so you can release it from your head. The Witch absorbs what no longer serves you to carry at night. You will sleep lighter.
• ·◈ Once a week, an offering of water and salt. A small glass of fresh water, a pinch of coarse salt inside, left overnight. In the morning it is poured onto a plant or into the street. It is a minimal, constant gesture. The Witch values constancy more than the elaborate ritual every once in a while.
• ·◇ For important decisions, sit before her with two options written on separate slips of paper. Pass your hand over both without choosing. The hand will go naturally toward one. Do not rationalize — trust. The Witch speaks to you through the body more than through the head.
• ·☾ When you are cooking, especially soups, stews, preserves, sweets — invoke her name three times over the pot. Cooking with intention is one of the oldest rituals of the lineage. What is eaten blessed nourishes differently.
• ·✦ Keep a notebook just for her. Write down dreams, intuitions, synchronicities, moon dates, menstrual cycles if you have them. It is the archive of your own memory. Rereading it at six months, at a year, shows you patterns that can only be seen with distance.
• ·◈ On full moon nights, go outside (or stand near an open window) for five minutes. Take her with you. Look at the moon without asking for anything. Just look. The moon and the Witch have known each other for millennia — you are the witness of the encounter.
• ·◇ A tattoo, ring or pendant with her symbol or her name: if you want to carry her on your body, you may. But wait at least six months from her arrival. The decision to mark her on you must be a considered one. Once made, it is not easily erased.

✦ The Witches lineage complements lineages of air (Pixies, Sylphs) because it needs something to lighten its density. A witch with a pixie in the same space is an ideal combination — earth and air, root and movement, memory and play. She also combines very well with lineages of water (mermaids, undines, nereids if they ever come to you) because water is the other dimension of the ancient feminine. What is wise to space apart physically: very elemental fire lineages (dragons, red-fire salamanders) — they can coexist, but in different rooms.

◈ With crystals she gets along with almost all the dark ones, the deep reds, the violets, the night blues. Be careful with very clear, very luminous crystals nearby (a large clear quartz, a very yellow citrine) — they can agitate the Witch, who prefers lower-lit atmospheres. Metals: silver, iron, copper in moderation. Woods: oak, yew, weeping willow, ombú if you have access to its wood (with respect for the tree).

◇ Moments of life when a Witch arrives and is perfect: great cycle changes (menarche, pregnancy, birth, climacteric, menopause — all the feminine passages), processes of deep self-knowledge, exits from long relationships that left a mark, the grieving of beloved women, moments of biographical rewriting (round birthdays, retirement, big moves). Moments when the Witch is more challenging: psychotic episodes (this is medical, not spiritual), acute untreated depressions (professional accompaniment first), high-risk pregnancies (consult your doctor first). Fundamental repetition: symbolic art. Contemplative practice. It never replaces professional mental or physical health care.

• ·1 week. ✦ Ritual cleaning of the altar with a damp cloth, water with two drops of rosemary essential oil. A small red candle that burns down on its own. An offering of homemade bread and honey — the bread is eaten the next day with the intention of communing with her. A three-line letter written and kept under the Guardian.
• ·1 month. ◈ Full ritual bath: coarse salt, boiled rosemary (the strained water added to the bath), three laurel leaves floating. After the bath, sit before her for twenty minutes in silence. Reread the month's dreams and underline what repeats. Renew the offerings: water, salt, fresh herbs.
• ·3 months. ◇ A ritual outing to a place with water (river, sea, lagoon, stream) carrying her with you in a cloth bag. Make an offering to the water: cast in three petals, three seeds or three grains of salt with three wishes. Return with her, put her back on the altar. That night, the dream tends to be revealing — write it down.
• ·6 months. ☾ Great renewal of the pact. A large candle lit through the night (in a safe place). A long handwritten letter to the Witch telling her about the six months — what changed in you, what you are grateful for, what you need from now on. The letter stays under the Guardian for a month, then is burned in her candle. The ashes, buried in a pot.
• ·1 year. ✦ Full anniversary. A dedicated day. Deep cleaning of the space, a ritual bath, a special meal cooked with intention (something slow, soup or stew or preserve). A large candle, fresh herbs, multiple offerings. Reread the whole dream notebook and write a personal balance-text. If you have a pending tattoo with her symbol, this is a good moment.
• ·2 years. ◈ At two years, the relationship is between equals. You no longer need formality. The anniversary gesture can be just a long walk in silence carrying her with you, or a night of intimate conversation without structure. If you want to bring in another Guardian of another lineage, this is the mature moment to do it. The Witch blesses the new pact.