Ash and I are leading a Pagan and Heathen tour of Iceland and will be back in early September. Please take advantage of the archives while we’re gone – I’ve been writing here since 2018, so there’s a ton of material to browse through. To avoid having an unmanageable amount of communication accumulate during my...| Glasse Witch Cottage
As a public representative of Paganism, I frequently talk to people who feel drawn to Pagan religions but aren’t sure if Paganism is the right fit for them. As minority belief systems, the specifics of Pagan beliefs and practices are not well-known in wider society. Additionally, the incredible diversity of Pagan religions means that although... The post You Might Be a Pagan If… appeared first on Glasse Witch Cottage.| Glasse Witch Cottage
Foundations of Witchcraft: A Blackfeather Mystery School Manual is the revised and expanded (over 10K words) text formerly known as Blackfeather Mystery School: The Magpie Training. This manuscript is slated for release through Crossed Crow Books for August of 2026. (The next Foundations training will be in September of 2026.) Pre-order your copy here. Foundations...| Glasse Witch Cottage
Month: July 2025| glassewitchcottage.com
When I look at the path of a river, I sometimes marvel at the way it cuts through stone to wend its flow through the landscape around me. I’m lucky enough to live near both the Potomac and Conococheague rivers and I’ve spent a lot of time wandering their shores and paddling kayaks along their...| Glasse Witch Cottage
In what should not be a surprise for anyone who knows me even a little, I am a former theater kid. Where some families are focused around sports, my family of origin was focused around the arts. I have been a performer my entire life. As a member of a theater family, this meant that as I was growing up, my wheel of the year – the anchors that helped me connect to the passage of time – took the form of theatrical productions. | Glasse Witch Cottage
Friends, Ash and I are so excited to share some big news with you. People who are local to the Western Maryland area know us as a team. Although I’m the one with a media presence, Ash and I are partners in pretty much everything. We write songs for Kindred Crow as a team, develop...| Glasse Witch Cottage
There’s a funny quote that circulates around the internet from time to time. It’s been attributed to lots of people, up to and including Sigmund Freud, but as far as I can tell it originated from a random person’s Twitter feed many years ago now. The quote reads: “Before you diagnose yourself with depression or...| Glasse Witch Cottage
This spring, I had a chance to sit down with JoAnna Farrer of The Coffee & Divination podcast for a lovely, wide-ranging conversation. We cover a lot of ground: tarot, divination, reconstruction of seidr, oracular work in general, Pagan community, and more. Check it out at one of the links below! General purpose link, for...| Glasse Witch Cottage
There is a stereotype within the Pagan community that gets encapsulated as “Epic Wolf Shirt Guy.” It’s an extreme form of animal kinship. Epic Wolf Shirt Guy has an animal they really resonate with, usually something sort of stereotypically Pagan, hence the wolf being the prime example of this stereotype. The joke is that they own 2,327 representations of their animal, have an altar dedicated to their animal, wear clothes with dramatic art of their animal printed on them, and may in fac...| Glasse Witch Cottage
I find myself continually grateful to live in Western Maryland. For someone of Pagan faith, whose spiritual practice is oriented toward aligning with the cycles of nature, it’s hard to imagine a better region in which to make a home. The cool rains of springtime fell heavily this year. Now, as we turn toward the summer solstice, the longest day of the year and the official “start” of summer, the green and growing spirits around us are bursting forth with wild abandon. Our lush, burgeoni...| Glasse Witch Cottage
The contemporary Pagan holiday calendar is based on astrological timings. We celebrate the solstices, the longest and shortest days of the year, as well as the equinoxes when day and night are of equal length. And, we celebrate the halfway point between each solstice and equinox. These are called cross-quarter days in many traditions since they occur halfway through a quarter section of a year. If you visualize the year as a circle with two lines dividing the circle in half vertically and hor...| Glasse Witch Cottage
(Content warning: death, grief)| Glasse Witch Cottage
Many years ago, I was introduced to the idea of selecting a single word for each calendar year to act as an intention, touchstone, and big-picture goal. The beauty of a single word intention is that the simplicity means multiple ways of connecting are possible.| Glasse Witch Cottage
One perspective common to most of the belief systems that fall under the umbrella term of Paganism is a desire to connect more fully with the natural world. There’s a recognition among most Pagans that Western culture, as a whole, has slipped too far from the cycle of the seasons and the interconnected web of existence. Indeed, treating the natural world as a resource to be exploited and viewing the lives of our non-human neighbors as meaningless and expendable has resulted in a world in tu...| Glasse Witch Cottage
I was a lonely child. I am now and have always been a bit of a too-much person. I have big feelings, an abundance of natural energy, and I’m very smart. I also fall into the neurodiverse world when it comes to how my brain works. I have some sensory processing issues that can cause trouble if they get too close to the surface. I know now that some of the behaviors and lashing-out I experienced as a child were a response to hitting neurological overwhelm. It’s easy to analyze all of that n...| Glasse Witch Cottage
One of the aspects of Pagan culture that can seem unusual to newcomers is the names that some Pagans take as part of our spiritual journey. Many times, these names are unfamiliar and identifiably not part of the larger culture from which we hail. Some of us only use our spiritual name in religious spaces like ceremonies and Pagan gatherings, but as taking a different name becomes more common in the wider culture, more and more Pagans are feeling empowered to legally change their name to their...| Glasse Witch Cottage
Depending on the metric you use to sort generations into categories, I am either one of the youngest members of Generation X or one of the oldest members of the Millennial generation. My birth year is 1980, which means I occupy a weird overlap between generational lines. One of the big ways both generations struggle involves money and property. According to the Schroders 2023 U.S. Retirement Survey, over 60% of non-retired Gen Xers do not think they will be able to fully retire. Based on conv...| Glasse Witch Cottage
