Tags
dionysus, essential oils, fragrance oils, natural, natural energies, offerings, pagan, Pagan Blog Project, paganism, Ritual, spirituality, synthetics, witch, witchcraft
J no. 1 – ‘Justifying Synthetics’
It is a fairly well-known and accepted precept in the Pagan community that synthetics hold little to no magical energy and should be avoided in one’s spiritual practice, especially in ritual practice or offerings.
I, personally, did my best to adhere to that rule for a very long time. However, it was mostly because I felt it would be hypocritical to, in my daily life, sing the praises of natural beauty products, household products, and recycling and then cluttering my altar with cheaply made, toxic synthetics. (Mind you, it still happened because sometimes I couldn’t afford the more expensive, natural alternatives.)
Zirconia; Fake diamonds never looked so good!
The idea makes sense in a way; the further from a natural source you take a product, the less natural energies it will hold. It becomes less sacred, and less powerful. In the food industry, processed foods may look and smell like their whole counterparts, but hold little to no nutritional value, and so these plastic doodads hold little to no spiritual nutrients either.
For this reason, I have avoided as much plastic as possible on my altar and use herbs and essential oils whenever possible. I’ve all but discontinued the use of pre-made incense and fragrance oils in my practice, and try to avoid buying new things for my altar whenever possible, opting for repurposed or second-hand things instead.
However, now that I have begun working at an occult and witchcraft store I have had to reconsider my position on the matter. It is difficult to do you job (selling products) when you look down your nose at a large selection of them. The most difficult for me was our selection of oils, which are largely synthetic (or a natural/synthetic blend). Oils play a big part in my craft (as I mentioned in this earlier PBP post), and I generally only use essential oils and so I was unsure how to proceed in selling them to others without betraying my values.
My answer came in the form of a silly little one-question ‘survey’ on Tumblr: “After you’ve died, what kind of offering do you want people to leave you?”
The most common responses were things like tea, cake, coffee, and cigarettes or incense. One that was very popular but that I’d never thought of, though it is a traditional offering to the dead, was to ask for perfume! It seems so simple, considering how many of us obsess over scent during our lives and try to find that “one true scent” that will become ours.
With that, I suddenly understood how I could not only justify, but understand using synthetic oils in ritual! If perfume is an acceptable offering for our ancestors and spirits of the dead, despite being synthetic, why couldn’t I use it elsewhere?
Click for where I purchase my essential oils.
Here is my thinking: My problem was that the lavender oil I sell at work would not be a mild anesthetic, would not induce calm, and would not be a natural disinfectant. The oil smells like lavender. That’s it. But, if I want to offer something that smells beautiful to a deity, and not worry about if it will tonify my skin, why not use a beautiful lavender perfume? The naturopathic effects are absent, yes, and inherent magical energy may be lacking, sure, but the oil is a symbol of what I want to achieve and can be programmed with my own energy and my intent.
Obviously I still prefer the idea of using natural ingredients in my spell work, but if I want to offer a perfume to Dionysus of opium, patchouli, hemp, honey, and apples I’d be hard-pressed to find the natural forms of some of those things. But, the perfume I make at work will be handcrafted, tested, and charged with my intent from the very beginning, which I think makes for a powerful offering.
I still recommend avoiding synthetics; little foam doodads, plastic sparkly decorations, paraffin candles (beeswax, good for what ails you!), and copious amounts of synthetic oils. Avoid these things for your own health, and for the health of the planet, certainly. But understand that in magic it is your intent, and in worship it is your respect, that makes the difference. Do what you can, and try to understand your impact on the world, both magically and physically. Your spirituality is entirely unique. It is not a cheap, mass-produced and disposable bobble, so don’t let it be represented strictly by those things!
Do you use synthetics in your ritual practice? Do you think there is grey-space on the subject, or are you more black-and-white about it? Do you think my point of view is still hypocritical? Honestly, let’s discuss this!
A Changing Altar 
I blogged about plastic a few years ago, pointing out that there’s no such thing as “synthetic.” There are only materials we do more or less processing of before we use them. For the more processed materials and tools, we need to know what energies we’re tapping into. For “synthetic” scents (which mostly means “smells like something other than most people would assume, if they knew its actual ingredients”), I’d want to know what was used to imitate the desired scent, and find a way to work that into the same symbolic meaning as the original source. If that’s not quite possible, find a way to work around the actual source materials and with the imitated scent–not tapping into the life-energy of the creature or plant involved, which isn’t there, but into the historic meaning of the smell for humans.
“not tapping into the life-energy of the creature or plant involved, which isn’t there, but into the historic meaning of the smell for humans.”
That was a point that popped up while I was brainstorming this post, and then it sank back down into the murky depths of my mind before I put it out in text! Well said!
You make an excellent point about ‘synthetic vs. processed’, although I think it comes down to the same thing. The processed stuff holds less of the natural energies we’d expect from something, but that doesn’t mean they are devoid of potential energy, capacity to hold energy, or purpose. I like your idea of trying to use the energies of what is actually there in the synthetic; it’s a very modern approach that I can foresee myself having a hard time putting in to practice, but I like it all the same! Haha!
Your phrase “… in magic it is your intent, and in worship it is your respect, that makes the difference” resonates with me. I don’t think you’re rationalizing your use of synthetics. You have obviously put a lot of thought into the matter, looking at it from different points of view, and come to an honest, sensible and completely (dare I say it) ethical conclusion. I admire your honesty.
Like I said to your friend on Facebook;
“…as long as you are using synthetics in moderation and only as perfume/fragrance oil (not internally, or for medicinal uses, the way you would use essential oils) you should be fine. I always promote using natural, but when you can’t you just need to keep things balanced and be aware of what you’re using. I often give this explanation to parents in the daycares where I work: “Non-toxic doesn’t mean healthy. Sand is non-toxic, but after your kid eats a few fistfuls and you have to change those diapers you’ll never let him do it again!” So, synthetics may not be poisonous, but they shouldn’t be your only option, either.”
We’re dealing with magic in these situations, but magic doesn’t mean leaving reality behind completely, and part of our modern reality is synthetics and other alternatives.
Again, thank you so much for all your support!
While the real essential oils and herbs do have more natural energy, it is the personal energy that people put into the spell work using the synthetics. Consider it a placebo effect. However, the placebo effect will work on things where the goal is easily attained without magic, for the big stuff where you want to pull in all the harmonizing energies as much as possible using natural elements are a considerable plus.
With that in mind feel free to pass out the snake oil to the masses.
Funnily enough, we do have an oil blend called Snake.
I have yet to sell it.
Thanks for commenting 😉
Actually with incense and oils I definitely prefer the real thing, because most of the artificial stuff tends to give me an headache.
Buuut… it is right, not everything used in perfumes is ‘real’ and I do have a room scent spray, that is for sure not real. (Tho’ I am incredibly picky about this kind of thing and it took me literally years to find one, I can live with.)
I had once a discussion about natural/not natural with another witch, it was focusing on polymere clay stuff in the end. And I was at first also: If it is not natural… but during our talk, I remembered, that I have some goddess figures I made from FIMO and I love them. And I used them to soothe myself on occasion, by holding them in my hand and contemplating or praying… so… is it not working, because it is polymere clay? Can’t say that!
Besides you can add a lot of useful spell components to a piece of FIMO and make a nice amulett from it. 😉
I agree your intent matters and while the “natural” items maybe preferable, I think part of what makes them important offerings is that they are and always have been expensive. I’ve found my deities mind synthetic scents much less than I do. (Migraine triggers – especially lavender scented oils for some reason, I am good with real lavender….)
I’ll point out though when I clicked on this I thought “is he a knitter” because I just had this debate with a bunch of my knitting friends about fibers. We came to the same conclusion: synthetics have their place. I think it’s important to note that natural things and the “real thing” is often expensive and our quality of life has improved so drastically the past century or so because of synthetics and plastics. I seriously doubt anyone who claims they’d be cool with life going back to the standard of living of 1880’s – they clearly never spent a summer on their great-grandparents farm having difficulty going back to 1910s! (Well water, hand pumped outside, outhouse without privy, no ac, fireplaces, gas lighting… grandma was excited they got a telephone in the 1970s. I should mention my great grandparents lived this way until the early ’90s because that was just their lifestyle and they didn’t see anything wrong with it, but they eventually did join us in the 20th century before they passed.)
I believe in most things in moderation; no need to subject yourself to some weird time-warp Survivor thing to prove how ‘real’ or ‘natural’ you are. Obviously I’d prefer it if most things were natural, but as you said, here in the 21st century, synthetics are matter-of-fact, and so we just have to use them with consideration to their impact, and reflect on their potential natural alternatives!
(I almost read part of your comment as “what is important is that your offering should be expensive” and I was about to be all “Oh! Hold on, girlfriend!” but then I reread it and realized I’d have been wasting my time, lol. Glad I got myself on the same page as you, otherwise I’d have looked silly!)
Oh! Though I think it’s important to note one should be careful when choosing: do your research on exactly *why* a natural item is being used. Synthetic tea tree oil won’t be a disinfect, etc. (Just discovered my mom’s natural cleaning products I showed her how to make weren’t working on mildew…. because she wasn’t using tea tree oil but a synthetic tea tree oil scented oil.)
Yes! Absolutely!
That was part of my conflict at the shop; if lavender is being offered up as a gift because it smells beautiful and represents something special, then the synthetic (or mixed, as it is at my store I’ve found out) oil should work equally as well. However, if you are using it for therapeutic reasons you absolutely need natural ingredients!
When people come to the store and ask for lavender or chamomile oils to help with sleep, I will generally offer them the herbs instead and suggest making a tea, herb pillow, or bath, rather than using the oils, as I think it would be dishonest to sell them the oils as therapeutic. The relaxing effects come from natural properties in the essential oils. Also, it might cause them to question their own spellcraft if they keep using these oils, not knowing that they won’t have the same effect as the natural ones.
I suppose that is just good spellcraft technique, though; knowing exactly what it is you are putting into your work, and why.
Pingback: J is for Junk Oracle « Cat's Journal