There Are No Ingredients, Only Allies: A Conversation with Matthew Venus

Matthew Venus of Spiritus Arcanum joins us to explore animism, witchcraft, and the spirits that inhabit everything around us. We dive into what it means to be a witch in today's world, examining the complex relationship between magical practice and capitalism.

• Defining what it means to be a witch through spirit work, spirit flight, shape-shifting, and bewitching ordinary objects
• Exploring panpsychic animism as a worldview where consciousness exists in everything from plants to rocks to spell bottles
• Understanding magical materials as conscious allies rather than mere ingredients in recipes
• Creating magical objects as vessels for spirits and developing relationships with the spirits we work with
• Using breath as a powerful magical tool for conjuring, offering, and transformation
• Navigating the contradictions of practicing animist magic in a capitalist world
• Challenging unhealthy authority dynamics in magical communities while valuing ethical eldership
• Reclaiming an animist perspective as a way to heal our relationship with the natural world

Join us next week for part two of our conversation with Matthew, where we'll discuss the Salem Witch Fest, making allies of plant spirits, and collaborate on a spell to connect with our ancestors.

Visit Spiritus Arcanum here!

spiritusarcanum.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Your Average Witch
• 0:35 Meet Matthew Venus of Spiritus Arcanum
• 5:01 What Makes a Witch: Spirit and Flight
• 11:40 The Animist Perspective: Everything Has Spirit
• 19:00 Working With Plant Allies in Magic
• 35:23 Breath as a Magical Tool
• 52:18 Challenging Authority in Modern Witchcraft

Transcript

Kimothy: 0:04

Welcome back to Your Average Witch, where every other Tuesday we talk about witch life, witch stories, and sometimes a little witchcraft. This week I’m talking with Matthew Venus of Spiritus Arcanum, an online and brick and mortar shop on the outskirts of Salem, Massachusetts. We talked a long time, in fact, so I split this interview into 2 parts. This is the first half, and the second half will be published next week. This week we talked about animism, what makes a witch, and the patriarchy.  Now let’s get to the stories! Matthew, hello, Welcome to the show.

Matthew: 0:40

Hello, thanks so much for having me.

Kimothy: 0:43

Thanks for being here. Can you please let everybody know who you are and what you do and where they can find you?

Matthew: 0:50

Certainly. Well, my name is Matthew Venus, he/him pronouns. I am an animist. Probably the heart of all of my practice is it revolves around an animist perspective of the world. I'm also a folk magician, an artist and a witch. I also am a Tata Ndenge in a tradition of Quimbanda Angola, which is an Afro-Brazilian tradition, as well as a Lucumí Orisha, which is an Afro-Cuban tradition, so those also inform my practice and the work that I do in this world. I'm the owner of an online and in-person brick and mortar shop called Spiritus Arcanum, which, amongst other things, specializes in handcrafted incenses and oils made to traditional recipes with natural botanicals. I'm also co-founder of the Salem Witchcraft and Folklore Festival here in Salem, Massachusetts, as well, as it's an online and in-person event, and you can find me at spiritusarcanum.com. That's spelled S-P-I-R-I-T-U-S-A-R-C-A-N-U-M.com. I'm also on the Instagram as Spiritus_Arcanum. Yeah, so that's me in a very small little nutshell.

Kimothy: 2:14

The shop is actually how I found you a long time ago. I think I've been following you since longer than I've had the podcast, because I sell jewelry and I was like, maybe, maybe he'll notice me on my other account.

Matthew: 2:32

Okay, yeah, yeah, I'll have to give it a look, yeah.

Kimothy: 2:36

And then I got… shoot. I don't remember exactly who it was that said, hey, you should interview this person. But then I got a direct referral. So now here we are.

Matthew: 2:49

Excellent. Well, thanks for having me. I love to talk magic, for sure.

Kimothy: 2:54

Yay.

Matthew: 2:55

Yeah, so yeah, I've had the shop. I mean, I've been doing this Spiritus Arcanum. As Spiritus Arcanum, I've been making and selling like incenses and oils and things like that for many, many years. But, Spiritus Arcanum officially was launched in 2012 and it really started off as just kind of a side thing that I was doing on Etsy, and grew into having a website and doing vending events regularly and then in 2019, I took the the kind of went where the spirits were leading me essentially and left my, my day job and began doing this full time and haven't looked back. It keeps me very busy.

Kimothy: 3:39

That's so neat. I love hearing stories about that stuff, how people start.

Matthew: 3:40

I feel like I was very much pushed by the spirits that I work with to do this as a full-time vocation, and a lot of the experience I had in retail management does bleed over into the business end of this, right? But I have been very much a practitioner and student of magic since the age of 12, even so, for quite a while at this point. So it is interesting to have it become one's vocation, the work that we do in this world. And that extends to, we have a retail shop, yes, but I also do a lot of teaching and crafting and making of magical objects and magical artwork and things like that as well.

Kimothy: 4:51

So in your intro you said that you were a witch. Can you tell everybody what that means when you say that?

Matthew: 4:53

Oh, sure, and of course this is, you know what it means when I say it, right, and that's the difference between like what when you say it or anyone else says it, right? I think the witch has different guises depending upon who is is speaking the name and and taking it on. But I do think, ultimately I view the word witch to be kind of a mantle that someone takes on and adopts or claims or, in some cases, has placed upon them, historically, when we think about witches, it existed predominantly initially as an accusation in a lot of ways, particularly when we think about that specific word witch, W-I-T-C-H as it developed throughout the medieval into the early modern period and such. So I believe now it's, I believe that it is, it is something that one can adopt or have placed upon them, kind of thrust upon them in certain ways, and sometimes based on life situations. But ultimately, I view the witch, or the concept of witch, really as almost like a spirit that is imbued by and informed by all of the the things that have been placed upon it, throughout history and it is a spirit which can inhabit us and we can choose to bring that spirit into us as a form of initiation and transformation, empowerment, augmentation, if you will. And also it is a spirit that we in turn inhabit. We become a part of the legacy of the expression of. We become avatars of witch and witchcraft in the ways in which that is expressed through us and our works and our actions and our impact upon the world around us.

Matthew: 6:41

For me, there are certain things that I tend to consider to be particular hallmarks of the witch and witchcraft that I feel are largely informed by a lot of historical understandings of the witch, but again this is my own perspective. And I think that witch, historically, and the magical figures and other types of even supernatural creatures that have oftentimes been seen as kind of corollaries in the definition of witch or that have been kind of retroactively translated to mean witch. So, for instance, you know figures like Medea or the Witch of Endor from the Bible. You know they were not called witches in their native tongue. But some of the identifiers that I consider to be indicative of witchcraft or witchery are, first and foremost, spirit work. Contracting with, engaging with, pacting with, interacting with and learning from and enacting your magic in this world in a lot of ways, predominantly through your relationship to and with spirits and the intercession of spirits, and by extension, I also then kind of some of the other things that I correlate with my understanding of witch and witchcraft is spirit flight as a part of that practice.

Matthew: 7:58

So what folks might refer to or otherwise envision perhaps, as you know, like hedge crossing or astral projection or shamanic journeying and things like that, but essentially the ability for one to send part of their consciousness or spirit out of their body and go forth into the other world or other parts of this world, but to disconnect a bit of one part of oneself and to go forth into other realms.

Matthew: 8:29

And then, beyond that, I think that also kind of touches into areas such as like shape-shifting, changing one's spirit form to take on different guises, whether this is a form of glamoury or this is going forth in spirit form and taking on animal form, things like that, and we could also extend this more into things.

Matthew: 8:48

I think that part of the witch, historically, and a part of witchery for me, is the bewitching of things, and that is transforming what might be seen as ordinary quote, unquote ordinary material objects and such, and awakening the spirit of those things, but awakening the magic within those things and turning them towards magical ends wherein a cauldron is much more than a cauldron, a broom is much more than a broom, that herb that grows on the corner of the street is much more than just a plant that is growing there. It has a magic all its own, and I think that a part of what the witch does is develop the capabilities for engaging with the world in truly magical ways, and awakening the magic and the spirits around us to work in concert with us towards the alteration of fate. 

Kimothy: 9:50

That's a lot. 

Matthew: 9:52

It is kind of a lot. 

Kimothy: 9:55

I'm going to have to absorb that.

Matthew: 10:00

So I think that it is interesting sometimes because you know I make space for and I recognize that.

Matthew: 10:11

I think that the witch, if we're thinking of the witch and I don't like the term archetype necessarily, but I like to think of it as a spirit or spirit complex even that is fed into by all that kind of quote unquote initiate into or take upon the mantle of witch. So it's not my place to express for anyone else who or what the witch is for them, and that would be hubris, I think. So I understand that. I think in a lot of ways perhaps my vision or experience of the witch or witchery may not always align with particularly the contemporary popular understanding or expression of what a witch is, or the qualifiers for that. However, I think ultimately they are reflective of my understanding and based upon historical connections, as well as just the way that I feel like what parts of my practice fall into the realm of witchcraft or witchery, as opposed to other parts of my magical practice. Because I don't view the terms magic and witchcraft as synonymous. I think that they have distinctions and have had distinctions historically.

Kimothy: 11:21

I like that. 

Matthew: 11:23

Thank you. 

Kimothy: 11:24

Well, I'm sure everybody is doing this. What I’m about to say. I’m sure everybody does this. As you were saying it I was trying to see if it would apply to my practice, and I thought “Oh, well, I don’t really work with spirits.” But I do work with plants, and that’s, they have that, so I guess technically I do. 

Matthew: 11:28

Yeah, yeah. I think that a lot of times when I’m talking to people about working with spirits,  and particularly, right, so I mean like I said, the heart so much of my practice and worldview is centered around this animist perspective. And for me I tend to refer to my general worldview as a form of panpsychic animism, which essentially posits, or puts forth, that consciousness is a fundamental quality of the universe, meaning that everything has some element of consciousness to it. So this extends to everything. Meaning you know, obviously, humans and animals, but plants and rocks, but also the wind. Also, you know the computer mouse that you may be holding right now, also even the concept of like, even I would argue that there's a certain spirit. Because to me this is then extends into kind of understandings of spirit. 

Matthew: 12:45

For me, spirit, the way that I tend to define what a spirit is is a pattern of consciousness that, when we are given the proper cognitive and sensory abilities, we are able to interface with.

Matthew: 12:58

And so what those cognitive and sensory abilities are, are going to be vast and varied, depending upon the individual. Witches, I believe, have the capability to engage with consciousness or spirits in a more unique and developed way, because either A I think some folks maybe were born with that aptitude or, more commonly, individuals have worked to develop the skill set to engage with spirits, whether it be through developing one's psychic abilities or intuition, or mediumistic abilities or divination and things like that as well, or spirit flight abilities. 

Matthew: 13:34

In the other world I think it is entirely possible to speak very freely with the spirit of a stone or with the spirit of the Mona Lisa. Not the individual that it was painted, but the actual artwork and all of the complex and expectations that have built up around that thing. Because I think that there are ties and tendrils that extend to things having a consciousness, ie a form of spirit, that in the right circumstances we can engage with those spirits of things. Hopefully that makes sense. I don't know, but in this sense where I do think that if everything has some semblance of consciousness, then we can engage with it as a personified spirit when given the correct tools and abilities to do so, if that makes sense.

Kimothy: 14:24

It does. I have two thoughts.

Matthew: 14:27

Yeah.

Kimothy: 14:29

Please let me say them before you interact with them, because I will forget what I'm saying.

Matthew: 14:34

Absolutely. 

Kimothy: 14:38

Okay so number one: I think a problem that I personally have with animism, though I feel like I am an animist, is I was raised Christian and like dominion over blah, blah blah, and so we are sort of trained not to think of things like that. And things, other things don't have souls or consciousness, as they're just things. And then also, when you were talking about how things have spirit, I thought of golems, and if they're supposed to come to be because we imbue them with spirit, would it already have its own? And do we like sort of kick it out? This is just a weird… whoa, what is this thought? That's just, this is one of the tangents that I go on.

Matthew: 15:33

That. No, that's actually a really fascinating, I love that. I love that, and it's something that is a big question, particularly in some of the work that I do. So I have you know, I'm not sure when this recording or podcast is going to go.

Matthew: 15:47

I have a forthcoming book that's coming out in October and it's called Ensouling the Effigy, the Witch's Art of Enspirited Objects, and so it is approaching things like creating spirit vessels, fetish objects, what I tend to refer to as effigies, but any type of humanoid forms that are intended to act as spirit vessels, or living statues, if you will. This also, then, touches over into the realm of puppetry and puppet magic as well. And I think that they’re… I want to talk to your second point first, and that would be if there is something, let's say clay, right, because if we're talking using a golem as an example, I'm talking about cla.y Does the clay already have a spirit? And if we're putting a spirit into it, are we somehow kicking out or grafting over the spirit that is existing in the clay itself? Is that that's? That's kind of what you're saying.

Kimothy: 16:51

Yes!

Matthew: 16:50

Yeah, I love that and I love that question, and I think that we I don't think there's an easy answer to it. I think there are approaches towards it, right, because when you think about a contemporary witchcraft model, energy centric model, right, which I would say I think the vast majority of most like neo-pagans and witches that I tend to meet tend to speak in terms of energy. So, I got this thing. It's going to be a new ritual tool, so what I'm going to do is do a cleansing on it, which, let's be real, a cleansing, in that case, is actually meant to be an exorcism, in the sense that you're meant to be expelling things from it, so that then you can imbue it with the your energy, or the energy that you're calling upon to dedicate this tool. So, in that sense, if we're looking at that from an animist perspective, you are kicking out a spirit, or at least part of spirit, and you are now imbuing it we could almost say that we are possessing it, yeah? with a new spirit, right? That we're placing a new spirit or expression of spirit within it. And I would argue that in some cases, we are expelling things. You know, I don't know that you can fully, truly expel the entire nature of the material that you're working with, though. Clay is always going to have some spirits of clay, and so the ways that I tend to work with things is not a totally dissimilar model, and I actually do what I would refer to as a cleansing or exorcism, and it is essentially to expel any elements of that thing, any spirits or any inclinations of that thing that may not any spirits or any you know inclinations of that thing that may not be well suited towards the purpose that it's becoming dedicated to,  but I also, I'm going to this is where it gets really weird, is I don't really believe that, like when we're talking about the spirit of clay, that it's just literally one spirit. I think there's a complex of spirits within them. I think the same is true of us, also, just to say that.

Matthew: 18:50

There are many different models of witchcraft that talk about a three soul model, and I think that, at minimum, the witch in particular has at least three disparate parts of self that could be referred to as spirits. So, in, in truth, as much as we want to walk around thinking that we are, you know self, I am Matthew Venus. You know, this singular entity and truth, you know, at the very least, I'm like three raccoons in a trench coat, walking around in a skin suit, right? And so if we talk about like, I don't know if you're familiar with, like some of the three model, but you know, oftentimes it's referred to as perhaps your higher self or holy guardian angel.

Matthew: 19:25

I tend to refer to this part of self as the grand genius, that part of us which is kind of more eternal and is oftentimes more allied to or associated with the celestial or, you know, or the supernal, heavenly realms. And then the middle self, oftentimes referred to, sometimes tied to concepts of ego, and the most self-expression of ourselves. That part that is really kind of, you know, that does the work that we are about in this world. Oftentimes, you know, I refer to this aspect of self, usually as crafter, or the crafter. And then the quote, unquote, lower self, which sometimes is referred to as a lot of times I tend to refer to in my practice and other witchcraft practices tend to use the same phraseology as the fetch self, which is usually tied very much to what we might consider our more animal nature, but also our survival, our more immediate needs. You know, the fight or flight or fuck part of a lot of ways.

Kimothy: 20:23

Monkey brain?

Matthew: 20:25

Yeah, we might call that the monkey brain, but the fetches also can be an incredibly powerful ally. Sometimes people will tie that to the quote-unquote shadow part of self if they're working, maybe from Jungian or Jungian-inspired models and things like that. But it is oftentimes also for those of us that tend to engage in spirit flight from a witching perspective, or sometimes what I refer to as transvection. It is oftentimes believed, at least from my perspective, that the part of self that we send out in spirit flight is actually the fetch self that goes out, and it's that part of us that oftentimes leaves and goes forth and does things while we're dreaming as well. So there's that, right, and I would also argue that that's just a three-soul model. There are many other aspects of self. I mean, if we really wanted to get animist about it, we could talk about all of the ecosystems that exist just on your own body, like your gut flora.

Kimothy: 21:20

We're going into one of my big fears.

Matthew: 21:23

Oh yeah? And the microbes. But if all of those have are an expression of spirit, you know we are in and of ourselves a universe or a world unto ourselves. So it's interesting when you start considering spirit and the idea of spirits on a macrocosmic level or a microcosmic level, right, when you zoom out or zoom in. And so, for these reasons, I sometimes believe that, you know, when we talk about clay, we can talk about the overarching spirit of all clay that exists, or we could talk about the spirit of that clay deposit that's in your backyard, or we could talk about the spirit of the clay that exists in the lump of clay that you're holding in your hand, you know, and how that might be altered through witchery. And I do think that to engage in witchery and magic is to alter the fabric of things. Oftentimes. I think it's best if we do so with elements of consent. But also, you know, there's sometimes there are things need to be exercised.

Matthew: 22:23

Currently it's summer, I have flies buzzing around my house and it's quite annoying because it's that time of year. So am I not going to kill those flies? I am. This is my domain, and they're a problem for me. So to me, I am exercising that. I'm not just going to do that. Nature has its own way of doing things. Nature is beautiful, and there is much creation in nature, but there is also much destruction and violence in nature as well. And I think to be truly animist it's not just about thinking of ourselves living a cottagecore life, like Miss Possum living in a tree with her children in her gingham apron, as cute as that is. But nature is beautiful and terrible in equal measure, and that is a part of understanding an animist approach, I think, you know. And I think that that's a part of witchery as well. Sorry, hopefully I'm not going off in too many different directions here.

Matthew: 23:19

So in some cases, when we're working with crafting a spirit vessel, a spirit object, a magical tool, amulet, talisman, what-have-you, fetish, there are some elements oftentimes of exercising those things that are not in alignment with the work I tend to really prefer. I will do that when necessary, but oftentimes I prefer to really try to bring all of the disparate elements into alignment. So one of the things that I talk about in this book is certain approaches towards actually giving. Let's say that you craft a fetish object and it is disparate materia, right, so it's like you have plant materia, animal materia, dirts from different places, stones from different places, and let's say that we're placing these all within a shell or a horn or something as the vessel. So we have all of these disparate ties to spirit. Right, we have all of this different. We might refer to it as medicine, we might refer to it as energy, if you will, we might refer to it as spirit signatures or nature or power or magical power, literally, right? That, like all of these elements, you know, a piece of a plant brings some of the spirit of that plant and brings some of the medicine and some of the power and some of the magic of that plant. For me, from an animist perspective, ideally in this process we're doing forms of conjuration where we're calling upon the spirits of those things. Essentially, I'm conjuring the spirit of this particular plant and I'm trying to ally with it and ask it to assist me in the working that I'm doing.

Matthew: 24:49

So in a lot of contemporary witchcraft I think it's an unfortunate thing that oftentimes what people look at are, you know, recipes for doing spells, and oftentimes things like herbs and stones and the like are oftentimes treated as little more than an ingredient in a recipe. That, if you get this magical recipe right, then it's going to change your world. And I prefer to approach things more about understanding the nature of that plant and why it is magical, as much as possible. Sometimes it's just the folklore, but oftentimes the folklore is informed by real active properties. For instance, to stop gossip, slippery elm is oftentimes utilized, and so is clove, and medicinally part of their actions. Slippery elm soothes a sore throat and clove numbs the mouth.

Matthew: 25:40

So, now that we know that we have a better understanding of the actions that these plants provide and the medicine or magic that they provide, and the ways that they work. So having a better understanding is to better understand their spirit by understanding their nature, and to call upon those virtues to assist us in the work that we're doing, because clove can also be used for money, magic and other things as well. So what part of clove, what aspects of clove are we trying to call forth to assist us in the working that we're doing? And that's a part of taking this spirit-centered, animist approach towards things just the conjuration of the spirit of the thing, to call it forth, to awaken the spirit of clove, and oftentimes this is by using just voice and calling it forth and speaking to it and personifying it. You know, even though I understand that clove doesn't speak English, it can respond to it because breath and word are powerful magical things, as we've known from our earliest mythos in history. And so bringing it into alignment with the working that we're doing, asking for its assistance.

Matthew: 26:43

And I have found that the plant world, the green world, is incredibly generous, incredibly generous with human beings, and very often willing to help us right, whether it be through nourishment or medicine or magic. And it's oftentimes awe-inspiring how I feel, how generous I feel the spirits of the greenwood or the plant kingdom are. So if you're beginning spirit work, that's a really good way to do it. You know what I mean. It's just start awakening to the idea that you can talk to the plant that you're working with magically and ask it for its help. You can better understand it by examining how it grows or learning about its phytochemistry and learning about its folklore and all of these things. And now you know that plant better, it becomes like a friend that you can call upon and that you know more about. You know more about its nature than just treating it as though it's something that you read in a book on magic that should be thrown into a bag or used to dress a candle because it's going to do something for you. It might. A dog's going to be a dog, no matter what right, but how much better is a dog going to be if it's one that you've befriended and trained and truly know and have given food to, and it becomes a reciprocal relationship.

Matthew: 27:56

So there's an element sometimes of working with all the disparate materia, bringing it together and then trying to get it to work kind of in concert together in this new form.

Matthew: 28:07

So it's almost like you're creating a bit of a chimera, or a Frankenstein's monster, if you will, or essentially a gestalt, if you will, when all of these things kind of come together to form a new whole. And so those disparate parts still kind of exist, but now they're working in concert and they have created basically a new spirit. Now a little bit more of your question: is it truly a new spirit or not? Sometimes, when I'm crafting such things, it often feels as though my hands are being guided, and I’m like, did I create a new spirit, or did I create a vessel which is in alignment with a spirit that was already out there, willing to be born into and take on the role of this work that I'm going to employ it for and build a relationship with it. I think that it can work both ways. Sometimes you can very intentionally create a spirit vessel that is meant to be in resonance with a particular spirit or deity and things like that, and in other cases people put together these little spell bottles and they're putting all these ingredients and things together.

Matthew: 29:07

What if you treated that as though you're crafting a spirit to do this work for you? What if you did lean into the anthropomorphism of it, lean into the animism of it and speak to that thing and ask it to perform for you, as opposed to making a spell bottle that you saw on TikTok and then you put it your desk and it just kind of sits there like a lump and you're poking it with a stick, hoping it'll do magical things for you, as opposed to actively engaging with it. I would like to see more of that in the world, and that's why I've written the book that I have written. And I'm hoping that it maybe at least inspires or encourages people. I don't expect it to be the final word, If anything I hope it starts more of a conversation in the broader magical community.

Kimothy: 29:49

This is exciting for me because I kind of feel like that's what I do. And I say hey can you, can you help me out with this particular thing as I put you into… whatever. It’s so neat.

Matthew: 30:09

Absolutely. I think that a lot of people actually have these leanings and inclinations, but it's not conversations that I see happening all that often. I do think there's space for that, and I do think that a lot of people will talk about the concept of animism within contemporary witchcraft, and it seems to be trending more, which I'm very happy about. But what might that look like in a magical practice, right? And in day-to-day interaction with the materials that we're working with, you know? So, yeah, absolutely, I think a lot of people I think a lot of people at least kind of touch upon this, and when you start to talk to people about it, even if it's not what they do, they start to- like I love talking to people about it and seeing little like light bulbs go off in their head that maybe it'll inspire them towards that. Because to, to reach back to your earlier point, we exist in an overculture that has taught people that the world is a resource to be exploited and utilized, and we exist in very much the fallout from that approach towards our world, which is essentially peak capitalism where we are, where we're looking at climate collapse we're looking at, you know, microplastics being in our blood. You know we're looking at the oceans and the coral of the world dying in a lot of ways or negative impacts based on human behaviors that have taught us that nature and the natural world and the spirits around us are something to be conquered as opposed to something that we can figure out how to live in concert with and to live in reciprocity with, and unfortunately we're so far into it. It's hard, it's very hard, but I think that you know, it behooves us as a species to lean more into, I think, what a lot of children know from a very early age, and I think what some of the earliest humans really knew and lived in their daily life. And that's kind of an animist heart. And it's hard. It's hard in our daily lives. You know the world is set up in a certain way, but I do think that it is relearning something that I think a lot of us lost along the way in the face of more hard polytheistic, and particularly monotheistic cultures, took hold. But, particularly, right, from this, more Christianized tend to view our viewpoint where the earth is a resource to be exploited at our pleasure and leisure. Right? And that's something that I think a lot of folks maybe need to unlearn.

Matthew: 32:58

I think that in contemporary witchcraft we still- and I fully understand the hypocrisy in this and the contradiction in this as being someone who is literally a magical retailer there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. That's the truth. But I do think that one of the prevailing things that I tend to see in the current era of like TikTokification of witchcraft and magic is really a hard lean into materialistic, capitalist kind of mindset that this thing is magic, I bought the thing, now I am magic. And there's not absolute untruth in some of that, but I do think that it can really lend itself to this capitalist kind of mindset, right, of acquiring the thing makes you the thing, as opposed to like, the way that you're actually engaging with the world around you or viewing the world around you. I hope I'm wrong about that.

Matthew: 34:02

Maybe I'm, maybe I'm too harsh in that,  but I do think that sometimes there's a bit more materialism and contemporary witchcraft and magic than I wish there was. And don't get me wrong, I am maximalist. But I do think it's, it is one of those things that I that I ponder a lot. You know, um is is, how that that exists in the like acquiring and, and how that exists in in an animist kind of worldview. I really try not to come from these things are to these things from a terribly judgmental place, because I'm as much of a product of the broader over-culture and the ways that we've been taught to be human as anyone else, and it's trying to unlearn and trying to do better. But we do exist in a system that makes it very hard to truly and earnestly engage with, to truly and earnestly engage with a reciprocity towards the spirits around us and the earth around us, and in a way which is as genuine as at least the ideal vision that I would imagine for it could be.

Kimothy: 35:13

What would you say is the biggest motivator in your practice and can you contrast it to the biggest struggle in your practice?

Matthew: 35:22

Yeah. I think that probably, if I were to be really poetic about it, I think that one of the bigger motivators in my practice is kind of- and it's such an overused term, but it's perhaps overused because it's relevant, but to exist in in a form of liminality in a lot of ways. And I think that part of that what that means for me is, it is, it's kind of a mercurial existence in its own way, in the sense of like acting in, sometimes being kind of a bridge between the discarnate or the spirits right and the material realm.

Matthew: 36:03

And that means giving things material form that might not otherwise have them, whether that's creating art or creating magical apothecary things or creating spirit vessels, right, but also doing things like giving readings to clients or students and giving guidance and kind of bringing messages across for people that I hope are helpful. And another big part of that, I think, is really because my goal, I think, is to hopefully create positive change in the lives of the people that are around me in whatever ways that's possible. So sometimes that is teaching individuals and transmission of knowledge in the hopes that that might help inform someone else's life and practice, and things like that. It can take a lot of different things, but if I had to break it down, I feel like I'm largely motivated by… I don't know. I guess fulfilling a role of making connections in ways that hopefully lead to positive changes in the lives of the people that I encounter. I think that's, it's a noble goal. Do we always live up to it? I don't know, but that, that's at least what I'm aiming towards.

Kimothy: 37:04

I like that though.

Matthew: 37:26

Whereas my biggest struggle is that lordy, I will tell you, I am never short of ideas of things I want to do, and things I want to create, and work that I'd like to do, and all these things, but my biggest struggle is literally just never having as much time, energy or money as I might want to be able to do all the things that I'd like to do in this world. And also just time management. Literally, I have my fingers in so many different areas, whether it's teaching or writing, or making art or crafting, or running a shop, or taking clients or doing the Salem, you know, doing the Salem witchcraft and folklore festival and other related events and markets and things like that that I do. It's a lot.  I often like to joke that my boss is an absolute tyrant. He never lets me have a day off. Because I will say, when you, when you know being a professional, you know magical practitioner, and which becomes your vocation?

Matthew: 38:43

It's the lines between what is work and what is practice and what is your own practice, and, and all of that really become very much more blurred, right, at least for me. For me, there's a lot of overlap, so sometimes it's just the time management, sometimes it's just allowing myself to actually sit and veg out and watch some stupid show on Netflix and be okay with that, even though I know there's a lot of other things that I could be doing. But sometimes I need to allow myself to kind of reset and also take a step back. I don't think it's healthy for anyone to live completely in the realm of magic 24-7.

Kimothy: 39:27

I relate to the whole the thing where you're- the necessary evil of having to sell spiritual things as who we are. 

Matthew: 39:35

Yeah, yeah.

Kimothy: 39:37

And capitalism and the state of our… everything's stupid right now. I relate to it.

Matthew: 39:45

It's hard, you know it's interesting because I I think that you know. But hopefully if you have got the internal struggle about it, then at least you know you're not just fully leaning into um being an absolute. You know that you have some scruples about you. You know you're not unscrupulous about what you're doing and generally the things that I provide and sell I stand behind, right, but they we do just exist. I mean generally, I would say I do stand behind the things that we put out there and sell. And you know I, even you know it's interesting. Building a magical shop is like you know. There are books and certain things that I carry that I'm like I don't particularly like this, it's not particularly for me. But it's like, yeah, but when you have a shop you need to realize that not everything needs to be specifically just for you. You want to be able to cater to other people and what their needs are, and what they're looking for in their practice. So that's an interesting thing.

Kimothy: 40:45

I relate hard to that, because I make jewelry but I do not wear jewelry.

Matthew: 40:50

Oh really, that's fascinating. I wear a lot of jewelry. I mean, although it's funny because the older I get, I wear less and less jewelry, but I used to.

Matthew: 40:56

I mean, I still do have. I, I have a jewelry problem. So one of these days, you know, when I pass away, everyone can fight over which of my beautiful jewelry pieces I get to have. But for now I have a hard time saying no to something pretty. So I do. That is one of my, my I do. I do like a nice pendant or ring, you know.

Matthew: 41:18

But yeah, it is a struggle. It is a struggle to try to feel like, you know, you're doing things, you know, in a way that is sustainable and ethical can always be a bit of a challenge. And again, you know, it's always interesting to me because sometimes, you know, people will ask me… we carry animal parts and things like that in the shop. I am a meat eater, I don't not eat meat, but you know it is interesting when we talk about ethics. The question when people are like you know how a lot, of, a lot of magical sellers or people will say, oh, this is ethically harvested, but what does that mean? You know, I would much rather have someone say how do you acquire these things? And then for them to determine what the ethics of that are, do you know what I mean?

Kimothy: 42:03

I make jewelry out of bones and things, and so on the bottom of every listing in my shop it says this is how I got it, this is where I got it, this is how I treated it. It's up to you to decide if that's ethical or not. 

Matthew: 42:23

Yeah, absolutely yeah. Yeah, because that's what I said. You know, when people say, is this ethically harvested? And I'm like, what do you define what you mean by ethically? You know what I mean because certain things that I carry are a result of like, like I've carried carrion crow parts which are it's a crow species from the UK, because it's illegal to have crow parts from the United States because they're protected in the United States, so native species you can't have. But I've carried parts from crows from the UK and those parts are a part of there's a crow hunting season in more rural areas that they do in order to keep the population down so that they don't destroy agriculture. Now, whether or not you think that is ethical or not is up for you to determine.

Matthew: 43:02

But these crow parts are just going to go rotting in the ground and if you think you know, and that's fine. Or you know, the person that I get them from collects them and treats them and then I receive them and I would hope that they're going to homes where the spirit of Crow is being honored and worked with in a way which is respectful and can hopefully maybe also bring some healing to that whole thing, you know.

Matthew: 43:27

But that's that's up for each individual to determine whether or not that particular scenario feels ethical to them, and I won't begrudge them either way. We're all allowed to have our own feelings and decide what we do and do not want to engage with in our own craft, in our own practice, right. But I feel like to just have a blanket statement, “This is quote-unquote ethical” isn't  the most helpful thing,  and so I think that applies to a lot of different elements of magic in general, because I live in Salem. And every year I will say kind of like the same type of conflict or inner conflict that we see. It's interesting to live in a place where actually what happened was a tragedy and a bunch of innocent people were accused of being witches and murdered for it, and now there's a booming tourist industry for a bunch of folks that show up.

Kimothy: 44:21

Yeah, that's real weird.

Matthew: 44:22

Yeah, that show up in witch hats and are largely here just because they like Halloween movies or they saw Hocus Pocus. And then there are practitioners that show up here too, and arguably we could argue that Salem has been, quote unquote, reclaimed by the witches, but there's also always been a commercial element tied to that in Salem Massachusetts that a lot of the people that were the first people publicly claiming themselves witches in Salem Massachusetts were also making money off of that. So there is that struggle, right. Are you making money off the backs of a tragedy? Is your, if you're, are you making money off the backs of a tragedy? Are we honoring the spirit of, like, what actually happened here? And another part of it too, is just kind of the broader commercialization of, of magic and witchcraft, and how do we all feel about that? You know, it's, it's…

Matthew: 45:11

Those are all questions that I don't think there's easy answers to, and there are questions that I do ask myself pretty constantly. So I think that that does fall into, you know, like, what's one of your primary struggles? That is kind of one of my primary struggles, is existing in a system that I don't always love and trying to figure out the best ways for me, at least personally, to navigate that. But what really makes it worthwhile to me is when somebody who has come into my shop and purchased something or maybe taken a class or other things, shares with me how that made a positive change in their life or was really meaningful to them. That is, ultimately, I mean, of course, you know we've got to put food on our tables, we got to do what we're doing, but my ultimate goal is that, you know. There's nothing more meaningful to me than hearing something positive like that from a person. I don’t know what more we can really ask from the world, and I don’t want to pretend like owning a witchcraft shop is somehow in anyway comparable to, I don't know, being a heart surgeon or a humanitarian feeding starving children in third world countries, but I like to hope that what I do has a meaningful impact on the lives of the people that it touches.

Kimothy: 46:29

I agree. Now that we're talking about this stuff, kind of, what is your favorite tool in your practice? It doesn't have to be a physical object, it doesn't have to be stuff. It can be like a theory, or it could be spirit or it could be a song. What is your favorite tool and how do you use it in your practice?

Matthew: 46:54

I like that because, yeah, I would say my favorite tool is not a physical tool, it is breath. Breath is a huge part of my practice and so much of the way that I kind of my business. Spiritus, or Spiritus Arcanum. Spiritus is a term that refers equally to a spirit or the spirit, but also to breath, and when we look at so many different words throughout history and the ways that they have come to be like pneuma, which means oftentimes spirit but also relates to breath, we see this in the way that it's utilized in the word pneumonia, right Speaking to the breath and the breathing process, but even the term aenima, that it is the root for animism. Aenima can refer to spirit, but also breath. When we talk about enspiriting things, it's also similar to inspiration, but inspire is to breathe into or be breathed into, just in the same way that to expire is to breathe out. So when we expire, it's our last breath leaving us, right, and inspiration could be linked to the first breath or the breath of life, or being inspired or breathed into by the spirits around us or the gods around us. So breath is tied to so many different phraseologies and terminologies in these ways and intrinsically linked to spirit and spirits and the transmission of those things and life, transmission of those things, so, and life, right. But for me, breath is tied also to the word, right, the power of word, the ways that we use the magical voice and that we conjure forth spirits, and we, we can change the world through our words. You know, for better or worse, we see a lot of that these days, for better and worse, the way that people utilize words. And you know, like I touched upon earlier, so many of the deities or spirits that are oftentimes tied to magic itself are linked to words, right, and linked to communication, because that is magic, you know, the communication of things.

Matthew: 49:18

So I use breath a lot when I'm conjuring things, when I'm calling upon things, when I'm breathing life into magical objects or transferring magical power. I also use it a lot in the ways that I tend to call or give offerings to spirit. I think that it's great to be able to leave physical offerings for spirits, but sometimes the offering that I leave is a song, an extemporaneous song singing to the spirits of places, and the breath is a powerful thing. To give in exchange is particularly consciously give in exchange to plant spirits, right, because we're breathing together, our inhalations are their exhalations and vice versa, and so giving breath in exchange when we're harvesting plants and things like that, can be an incredibly powerful thing, and I utilize a lot of wind instruments in some of my practice, so I really like playing various forms of, like flutes and ocarinas, as forms of spirit calling, but also as forms of kind of spirit offering. So, yeah, breath is a big one for me.

Kimothy: 50:25

I like this conversation.

Matthew: 50:26

Thank you. 

Kimothy: 50:30

What do you wish was discussed more in the witch community, or magical community?

Matthew: 50:38

Well, that's a really good question, and I think we've touched on some of it today, right? 

So like I do think yeah, I think some of it is. I really do think that I wish that people would perhaps, at least for fun you know, for funsies, as a fun thought experiment, perhaps try adopting a bit more of an animist worldview and a better understanding of looking at the world through an animist eye. Because I think that when we look at the world through animism, it becomes oftentimes about relationship and reciprocity to the things around us, including the people, plants and all things, and this doesn't mean that we're all love, light, hunky-dory with everything. As I said, you know, great beauty and great terror exists in equal measure in nature, you know, but understanding our own kind of personal spiritual ecosystem that we exist within, I think, can be an incredibly powerful thing, both magically, but also in the ways in which we, just as human beings, begin to engage with the world. So that's a big one for me. I think it would be really cool to see more of those discussions and I do see more of those discussions happening, talking about people working with spirits, talking about animism and those approaches, and I do see that becoming more of a thing. And it's interesting because I see some old guard folks or cantankerous witches rolling their eyes that this is the new trendy word, and fuck it. If there's going to be a word to trend or a concept to trend, it should absolutely be animism, and we should all be pushing for that.

Matthew: 52:10

From my perspective, in so many ways, when we think about animist ideas about the world or approaches towards the world, it's oftentimes referred to, for better or worse, as the world's first quote unquote religion, and I do think that a return to that mentality does charge us as human beings to act more in relationship with and reciprocity and understanding ourselves, to be about in a broader ecosystem as opposed to at the top of some hierarchical anthropocentric chain. You know,  that actually we exist in concert with and in reliance of the natural world around us, and human beings seem to have forgotten that, and we're suffering a lot of ways because of that. So that's probably a big one. Another thing that I'll just throw out there that I think is is worth talking about is the realm of like authority and eldership within magical practices and witchcraft, and there's like two far ends of that spectrum, like two far ends of that spectrum, and I think one end of that spectrum is the. I'm searching for a guru. I'm searching for a daddy kind of approach where oftentimes people will elevate the voices of authors or teachers and things like that, and I would say disproportionately male teachers and authors and I would say disproportionately gay or queer male authors and teachers and I say this fully as a gay, queer male author and teacher that sometimes I think those voices are highlighted more and perhaps given a bit more status not in all places, thankfully, but I do think that's a thing that happens.

Matthew: 53:51

But just in general, the deferring to authority in the realm of contemporary witchcraft, I think that we should respect where people are coming from, respect their journey, respect their experience, but I don't think that as a witch, it behooves us at all to search for necessarily a guru or savior, and I think some of this is carried over from the broader patriarchal culture and Christianized kind of holdovers from individuals that join into neo-paganism and witchcraft, and haven't fully healed beyond some of those things, because also it's reinforced by our culture. Our culture absolutely reinforces deferring to particularly male authority and, and specifically, more often than not, white male authority and I think that that can be detrimental in some cases if what you're looking for in witchcraft is for someone to give you all the answers and to be your savior, then you are not claiming your power or your sovereignty as a witch, and that's a problem. For me, I consider claiming your power and sovereignty as a witch to be fundamental to a part of being a witch and what that is to be a witch. But that's me, you do you. But in the other flip side of this is then the other, complete opposite end of the spectrum, which is the absolute bucking of all authority and the absolute bucking of all eldership or hierarchical structures, where I don't need anyone to tell me anything.

Matthew: 55:20

I got this, I can figure it all out, I know all the answers. And it's this interesting kind of play between certain aspects of, like our, our, the way our society teaches us to defer to like patriarchal kind of models and male authority,  and the other side of it, which, in kind of a peak capitalist kind of model of things, is this hyper individualism that's sold to americans,  particularly, or in the west, perhaps,  and so it's like these two far ends of the spectrum that I feel like oftentimes work against an individual's progression. I think that community can be a good thing, or at least recognizing people that may be able to function as ethical, reliable elders. Now, that being said, in contemporary witchcraft and Wicca, there have been a lot of bad actors who have been more than happy to take on the term or role as elder. So I understand the pushback of that, and I think that's one of the things that contemporary witchcraft obviously really struggles with in a lot of ways. It's like who do you treat as an authority? Who can you trust as an authority? And in that, that is hard.

Matthew: 56:33

So I always encourage people ultimately to yes, think for yourself, to question authority, to recognize that no person, no witch, no teacher, no author is an infallible being. Do not put them on pedestals, because they probably don't want that. And don't trust anyone that does want a pedestal. Those are the types of people you should avoid. I don't want to be put on your pedestal. I tell my students right out the gate I'm not your guru, I'm not your magister, I'm not your high priest. I'm literally just someone who has been doing this for a while and I want to share the things that I'm excited about in hopes that it will be exciting to you and helpful to you, because I am not an infallible creature and no one is, and I think that that model of deferring to authority or treating authors like they're rock stars, or treating elders and high priests as though they're somehow also meant to be infallible, as opposed to being someone who has earned a certain role and authority in the tradition that they're in and also may be a fount of knowledge, so does deserve some level of respect for that, but not one where they're put in a position that is unrealistic for them, or one where you are allowing them to be put in a position where they could potentially be abusive, right?

Matthew: 57:45

That's the struggle. And I guess I kind of wish that that was discussed a little bit more in nuanced ways, because I think that the role of passing of information and eldership and things like that is somewhat dying out in contemporary witchcraft and, on some levels, given the previous model for that, I understand why and I think it's not necessarily a bad thing. But I think that it's something that we should explore, and I don't really have answers for that, but I think it’s a discussion that would be interesting to encourage more.  Particularly as someone who has experience firsthand with a lot of African traditional practices, religions like Quimbanda or Lukumi. We're talking about traditions there that have existed, you know, for a very, very, very long time and you know we have elders in those traditions and there's a passing of information that oftentimes you don't learn unless you show up and learn from oral transmission from an elder the ways of the practice, and it's oftentimes also it's a community-based model in a lot of ways, and I don't I feel like that word that that is not something that we see in contemporary witchcraft and I think that in some ways, it could benefit from that.

Matthew: 59:07

Yeah, and having an elder in that tradition doesn't mean that you, you always have to agree with them. Do you know what I mean? Because, again, we shouldn't be putting elders on these pedestals where they're meant to be infallible and you're supposed to love everything about them and also, totally, 100%, under every circumstance, kiss their ass. But, on the other hand, I don't think we should just be so focused on a hyper individualist practice that we are actually cutting ourselves off at the feet and not allowing ourselves to the benefits of learning from people that have put in the work and have been a part of these practices for quite a while phrase.

Kimothy: 1:00:03

This isn’t exactly what you’re talking about, but this conversation reminds me of one, the phrase, I think it's don't meet your heroes. And number two, Neil Gaiman and the Harry Potter franchise. 

Matthew: 1:00:10

Yeah.

Kimothy: 1:00:11

And all these people that we hold up and hope they're great, like Joss Whedon, yeah, and it turns out they're kind of shit people. 

Matthew: 1:00:17

Yeah, I, you know it's kind of a for me there's also this like no gods, no masters, like kind of kill your darlings. 

Kimothy: 1:00:20

Yeah, I don't like being told what to do, so I kind of fall on that part myself.

Matthew: 1:00:24

Yeah, I don't do it, Well the interesting thing, too, is like I don't do well with authority  [fades out]

Kimothy: 1:00:31

Well, that's it for this half. Be sure to tune in week when Matt and I talk about Salem Witch Fest, making allies of plant spirits, and we let you listen in as we collaborate on a spell for connecting with our ancestors. 

Thanks for listening to this episode of Your Average Witch. You can find us all around the internet on Instagram, @youraveragewitchpodcast, facebook.com/groups/hivehouse, at www.youraveragewitch.com, and at your favorite podcast service. If you'd like to recommend someone for the podcast, like to be on it yourself, or if you'd like to advertise on the podcast, send an email to youraveragewitchpodcast at gmail.com. Thanks for listening and I'll see you next Tuesday.