Discipline and little promises for the new year.

So 2009 is just days away and like many people at this time I find myself reassessing my life. I look at what I feel I have achieved, I look at where I am now and I look at where I want to be. I've been making little promises to myself about the things I want to work on. I never call them "resolutions" because that seems to automatically set me up for failure.

I have both career aspirations and spiritual aspirations for 2009, and obviously, given the nature of this blog, I shall focus here on the spiritual. For the last few months I have been actively working on transforming my body, or rather, getting into my body. Physical exercise has always been an issue for me in that I often feel I haven't given my body enough of it. I walk a lot as I don't drive but I plan to do more of this, alongside other exercise forms and a healthy diet. I lost a stone and a half in weight a couple of months ago because I did a scarey TFR (total food replacement) diet, which although approved of by pharmacies in this country, is still a pretty controversial topic which undergoes continual debate amongst various nutritionists and health experts. I basically drank two special "milkshakes" a day, along with drinking lots of water. That was it! I was taking in 500 calories a day and I lost 12lbs in the first week of the diet and within three weeks i'd lost a stone and a half. I've lost weight rapidly before (only to put it back on later) but this was a bit too fast! I couldn't keep up with this ascetic diet because unlike some people, even though I had well and truly sent my body into ketosis, I still felt intense hunger throughout the day (for others, the state of ketosis removes the feelings of hunger). For the last month and a half I have been eating anything and everything (Winter particularly brings out my worst eating habits...I eat whatever I can get my hands on and ignore the calories) As of tomorrow I am going to be forcing myself to eat more sensibly.

With regards to exercise, I have been learning various postures from Ashtanga Yoga and was initially very good with myself and maintained a daily practise for a couple of months (along with two to three miles of daily walking) but alas I have slipped into doing my Yoga once a week if that. Once again, this must change and I plan to get back into my daily routine. I also want to start attending a class (I know of a few good ones here in Manchester) as practising with a group of people will probably enhance my learning and spur on my progression. I am also currently half way through a 6 week push ups programe which involves push up sessions three times a week. By the end of the programme I am supposed to be able to do 100 push ups in one go. Not an incredible feat for some of my fitter friends, but i'm looking forward to making it, and whilst my arms have been in some pain, I can feel the benefits and increase in strength already.

As you may have gathered, my overall theme for 2009 will be DISCIPLINE! I need to discipline my body and what food I put into it and I need to get back into my body. There are probably some people out there who do not feel that physical exercise and healthy eating has much at all to do with spiritual and magickal practise, but I would have to disagree. I find that being healthier is more grounding and stabilising and also really aids in my focus and concentration (the Yoga is especially good for this) I have spent a lot of time on the outer shell this year, I went a bit crazy and got four more very visible tattoos. It's time to work from the inside out. It's time for a major detox!

On a more recognisably magickal level, there are a few things I need to work on. I need to get back into my daily rituals. 2008 has been a very lax year in terms of ritual work, both in terms of coven and solitary practice. Again, I am getting back into the swing of things now though. The Isis shrine is getting more attention as of late (really working on building on my relationship with Isis and am back into communing with her on a daily basis, usually during the night) My permanent Wiccan altar (which I always keep even when i'm going through lazy periods) is getting more and more attention again. I need to get back into my regular energy work (activating and closing the chakras once a day really helps) and my elemental balancing and weekly self-blessing. So many of those little practices I engage in once a week or once a month sometimes, really need to be done once a DAY. One good thing that I can say for myself however is that I have always maintained my daily prayers.

My dreams have been more vivid as of late, and I need to get back into the habit of recording these (no one said the magickal life was easy!)

With regards to spellwork done this year, it has been mainly concerned with financial improvement and helping me to get a job. The spells worked well and were of Hoodoo extraction. Hoodoo has been of significant help to my life in the last couple of years.

I have been especially drawn to the symbol of the ankh recently. I have always loved this ancient glyph but only wear one occassionally. I am feeling the need to wear an ankh at all times at the moment (I realised yesterday that I actually own 8 silver ankh pendants now...such a terrible magpie) At first I wasn't sure why I kept finding myself thinking of the symbol, obviously, it is often associated with Alexandrian Witches, along with the goddess Isis, but I felt that there was a more immediate reason why the symbol kept penetrating my inner vision. Once i'd actually spent a few moments of meditation on the symbol it suddenly dawned on me that the ankh represents that which is top of my agenda at the moment - my health! The ankh is life and vitality and health, and I want to emanate this in abundance! For the forseeable future I have decided to keep a silver ankh close to my heart at all times to remind me of my goals.

Introduction

Hello, I'm known as Seth by quite a lot of people and I have been a practising Witch now for about ten years. I've been working within the Alexandrian tradition for about three years thus far and am familiar with the practice of keeping a magickal diary of all spiritual and magickal work undertaken. I enjoy writing and have kept a livejournal account for about the last five years. I have set up this blogspot account to be used as a kind of magickal and spiritual diary, since my livejournal account is mainly concerned with the more mundane aspects of my life.

This blogspot account will focus on any thoughts or musings I may have concerning the esoteric and the sacred. I will not be writing about the work I do in my group since that stuff needs to remain private and firmly within the pages of my Book of Shadows. I will just be writing about that which I feel comfortable in discussing and will likely focus a lot of attention on my work with the Goddess Isis, whom I have considered myself a devotee of for pretty much the same length of time as I have been involved with the Craft. Really, i'm doing this for myself. I enjoy blogging and the satisfactory overview and perspective it can give on my life. I also enjoy reading about other people's practices and experiences within the world of spirituality and the esoteric, so i'm sure that some of my entries may be of interest to others. Anything worthy of note that I come across in my research or any interesting books I am reading at the time will also likely receive a mention.