Why you NEED a Grimoire for Witchcraft
You’re in the right place if you want to…
learn more about magic books like grimoires and books of shadows.
understand the important role they play in a witch’s practice.
know the next steps you can take toward making a grimoire for yourself.
Subscribe here to be notified about new episodes.
Let me start by painting you a picture.
Tell me if any of this sounds familiar...
You have a library of witch books, but you can never find the information you need when you need it.
You've taken several trainings or courses to develop your witchcraft skills, and you took notes but you can never remember where the notes are.
You know there are certain times to perform certain magical activities, but can't remember when those are.
You have searched Google for the answer to your question, but you are always met with conflicting information.
You’ve asked for advice in Facebook groups, and there are always people who respond with judgement and criticism.
Can you relate to any of those scenarios?
You see, without a plan for organizing your magical information and witchcraft practice, you will always find yourself confused about how to manifest your desires.
BUT, when you create an organization system, you will always know exactly what you need to know when you need to know it.
That's because your witchcraft practice is unique, and what matters to you is different from what matters to
the people in that Facebook group you belong to...
the writer of the blog you read...
the author of that book you bought...
What you need is a grimoire.
What is a Grimoire?
A grimoire is a book that contains any kind of magical information.
It can be made from a variety of different materials.
It can be hundreds of pages long or only contain a couple of important pages. I use the word pages loosely because some grimoires may not have physical pages as we’ll see.
This book may be passed down from one generation to the next, or a witch may create a brand new grimoire for their own practice.
A grimoire is incredibly personal and unique to each witch just as a practice is personal and unique. What is integral to one witch’s practice may not be to another and therefore isn’t included in the grimoire.
Regardless of what the grimoire looks like or contains, it is special.
It’s important for you to create a grimoire that is specific to your needs as a witch, your lifestyle, and your magical practice. Otherwise, you are unlikely to use it.
A grimoire or book of shadows is not strictly necessary for one to be a witch; however, many witches find it to be truly useful if not essential to their practice. It is a record of your practice, a journal of your deep thoughts, and a personalized encyclopedia of spells, correspondences and practical information.
There are many, many reasons to keep a magic book. I’ll discuss seven today. As you go along, with your practice, you will probably discover countless other reasons to create and work with your own personal grimoire.
My hope for you is that after reading this post, you are excited and energized about starting a grimoire or getting back into working on your current magic book.
#1 See How You’ve Grown
The first reason to keep a grimoire is that you will see how you have grown as a witch.
As you look back on your grimoire, you can look at the spells you’ve done and how they worked. Whether they worked or not, you can try them again as a more experienced witch and see how your skills have changed and grown.
You’ll also be able to add to the magical uses of the tangible and intangible materials like herbs, crystals, symbols, and colors based on your experience. For example, maybe traditionally blue is considered a calming color, but you used a blue candle to help you manifest your dream vacation with success, and now you view blue as a color of exploration.
If you are keeping track of your spiritual beliefs and your intention for practicing witchcraft as I suggested in a previous episode, you’ll have a record of exactly how your beliefs have evolved since the beginning of this journey.
#2 Discover Your Witchcraft Style
The next reason to keep a grimoire is so that you can discover your witchcraft style.
Again, this is a record of your practice. Every spell you’ve cast, the herbs, crystals, symbols, and colors you use, the corresponding spirits, deities, and energies you work with, the words you use.
As you journal and record your practice, you will see the types of magic you are drawn to and what tends to work best for you, whether that’s using candles, herbs, or crystals, following the cycles of the moon and stars, working with spirits, deities, or animals, or connecting with the rhythm of the earth.
Having this type of information can be really beneficial to your growth as a witch. You will be able to focus on the kind of magic that suits you best or on developing the areas that you aren’t so strong in.
Whatever you do with this information, it will be helpful to your overall practice.
#3 Remember Spells and Rituals
The third reason to keep a grimoire is so that you can remember which spells you’ve performed. You’ll know when you cast the spell and how it made you feel.
I’ll say it again, your grimoire is a record of your practice.
If you want to do a spell for a particular intention, you can look back to see what you’ve tried before, whether it worked, and how you’d do it differently in the future. That way you will know what’s worth putting your precious energy into, and what is not worth your time.
And as I said before, you’ll notice a pattern in the types of spells you tend to be drawn to, and which ones seem to work better for you as a witch. This is your personal style.
#4 Edit the Work of Others
Reason to keep a grimoire number four is that your grimoire is a place where you can make edits to your spells and perfect them for your unique magic.
Books and online libraries of spells are great for getting ideas and inspiration, but those spells are aligned with the person who wrote them and how they practice magic. Every time you find a spell you want to try, record it, but edit it so that it fits into your personal brand of magic and belief system.
If a spell calls for a crystal you don’t have or don’t particularly like, change it to one that is aligned with the purpose of the spell and fills the role.
If a spell asks you to work with a goddess you don’t know, feel free to call upon a goddess you are already familiar with or have worked with before.
If a spell asks you to burn an ingredient in order to banish or dispose of something but you feel like burning will actually give the thing you are trying to banish more power, change the action to burying, or dissolving in water, or flushing down the toilet, or throwing in the trash can, or something else that feels more like an act of banishment to you.
Do you see what I mean?
In this way, you are creating a perfect magic book that is personal and unique to you. It’s not that the original spell is wrong or doesn’t work for some people, it’s just that you don’t feel connected to it in its current state, and you are altering it to suit your practice and beliefs.
#5 Compile Your Legacy
One really cool reason to keep a grimoire, reason #5, is that it is an opportunity for you to leave a legacy.
Think about it this way. Our ancestors didn’t know what they were doing was special. They were writing down their day to day activities, reminders to themself, notes about their observations. And modern witches are grateful for the work they did recording their magic, sometimes at great personal risk.
What you are doing now is special, even if it doesn’t feel that way to you. Write down what you are grateful for. Write down what you do in the day. Write about the spells you cast and how they made you feel, and whether they manifested as you expected. Write down your experiences with the spirit realm and with crystals and herbs. Record the symbols you see and the sigils you create.
When you create something beautiful and magical it can be shared with fellow witches and future generations of wildlings. Your grimoire is a bewitching gift to the world and one day in the distant future, maybe YOUR grimoire will be considered a great historical magical manuscript.
#6 Make a Resource
The next reason, and perhaps the most obvious reason, to keep a grimoire is that it is a valuable reference for you.
A personal grimoire is so much more convenient than a pile of books on witchcraft, spirituality, divination and symbolism. It’s highly unlikely that you need to hold onto every bit of information in every book and article you’ve read on witchcraft, especially since there is likely some redundancy.
But here and there, as you’re reading and researching and learning, something might catch your interest, and you can record that in your grimoire for future reference.
For example, you probably don’t need the entire book on every crystal ever named, because you probably don’t possess all of them. Instead, learn about and record information about a crystal each time you collect a new one.
The same goes for herbs. It’s cumbersome to look through a massive book of herbs when you could just look in your grimoire that is filled with profiles of the herbs you actually use.
And maybe one of the books you have goes into great detail about palmistry, but it’s not something you are interested in. But you bought the book for it’s information about Tarot. Take notes on the parts that apply to your practice and your interests.
With a grimoire, you fill the pages only with what you want, and then when you need that information, you don’t have to look through pages and pages of information that doesn’t apply. You can flip through and everything you see is relevant to you.
#7 Manifest Your Desires
I think this last reason is possibly the most valuable reason to keep a grimoire and that’s because the process is magical.
Creating the grimoire, adding information, and using the book in magic and mundane activities is a meditative and spiritual experience in itself.
In fact, I believe that keeping a grimoire is an important part of the manifestation process. When you put the thoughts in your mind on paper (or screen), you are taking them from the mental realm to the physical realm. In doing so, through the Principle of Correspondence, your ideas will become reality.
Additionally, writing creates a connection to your brain as well and helps you remember things. When you write something down, you are giving that thought attention. Later on, when you need that information, you may not remember exactly what it is, but you will remember that you wrote it down.
This is a kind of magic on it’s own.
Organizing Your Grimoire
So, now you know you need to start a grimoire, or get back into writing in the one you already have.
But you may be wondering how to keep the information organized, what kind of tools and materials to use, how much time you need to devote to this, how to keep your grimoire safe from harm and whether you ought to bless it.
What you need now is a plan that helps you approach creating, organizing, and using your Grimoire in a way that keeps how you practice witchcraft at the focus, so that you feel empowered to do things YOUR way.
Because, as I’ve said over and over, the purpose of the grimoire is to reflect your personal practice, not just copy everything from the books and blogs you’ve read.
And that's what you'll get in the Organizing Your Grimoire eCourse!
I created Organizing Your Grimoire to answer all the questions I got from students, group members, and email subscribers.
This information is relevant to anyone who wants to learn how to create, keep, and use a magic book for their witchcraft practice.
Now, let me tell you what you can expect to learn throughout these lessons…
Lessons
The main purpose of this course is to help you create, organize and keep your own grimoire. We will talk about the history of this special book, what it typically contains, options for creating and personalizing your own including modern interpretations, magical timing, writing in code, and more.
This course is not meant to dictate your creation process, only to guide you through some ideas and answer your questions. You will want to decide for yourself whether these suggestions are relevant to you, your lifestyle, and your practice.
I will present you with options, but remember to listen to your head, your heart, and your gut to guide you.
13 video lessons to guide you through choosing a magic book that will be both beautiful and practical, coming up with ideas for topics to include, and deciding on an organization method that works for your lifestyle and your practice.
Workbook and Homework
There is a workbook for each chapter. The workbook is designed to help you keep notes about what you are learning in the videos. I really believe that when you hear something and then you apply it, you master it. That's how you really imbed what you're learning.
There is also a homework document for each chapter. This is where you can find action steps, reflection questions, and tips for creating and using your grimoire.
25+ tasks, prompts, and homework assignments that provide you with action steps and quick wins to help you know exactly what to do next.
Bonuses
4 printable templates that you can use for repeatable pages: crystal and herb profiles, moon phase activities, and spell structure.
And any future updates.
an Organized Grimoire
It’s really amazing what having a well researched and organized grimoire that reflects your practice can do for you.
Say GOODBYE…
When you do you can say goodbye to forgetting important dates and rituals.
Have you ever found yourself scrolling Facebook or Instagram and saw a post announcing it’s the new moon, or the full moon, or a sabbat.
And your eyes widen because you totally forgot or didn’t know, and you jump up and wonder, “What do I do?” So you begin frantically searching for rituals, and tarot spreads, and spells, and guidance.
You rush to ask your questions in Facebook groups and receive hundreds of irrelevant comments and sometimes judgement.
When you turn to Google, you scroll endlessly, and click dozens of websites that return no help.
Or you flip through book after book, and find only complicated procedures with a list of materials you've never even heard of.
And after all that, you ultimately give up and resign yourself to a night of flipping through Netflix.
I hate that feeling, like I’m less connected to my spiritual practice, and like I’ve wasted an this opportunity to manifest your desires.
Of course, there will be more special days and time when we feel inspired. It’s not the end of the world to lose track.
Say HELLO…
But if you have a grimoire, and you keep up with researching and recording applicable spells, intangible and tangible materials, correspondences, types of spells, magical timing etc. your night would have gone more like this.
You’ve given yourself the time and space to connect with your practice in a meaningful way because you’ve paid attention to when those special dates are before they’re posted on social media and you’ve prepared.
So on the new moon (or the full moon or the sabbat, or a day when you are just feeling particularly magical), you have a clear idea of what to do to manifest your dream life.
And if you don’t, you know exactly where to look. You can flip to the perfect page in your personal magic book where you have written out a ritual that aligns with your belief system and your practice.
You’ve organized yourself and have learned to keep an inventory of materials so you can easily gather up what you need to complete the ritual.
And this means you are able to move your life in whatever direction you choose.
Summary
So, I hope you feel super energized about keeping a grimoire for your witchcraft practice. I’ve given you at least 7 reasons today: you can see how you’ve grown, you’ll understand your own style, you’ll have a record of past spells, you can edit spells to reflect your beliefs, you can leave a legacy of your practice, it’s an incredibly valuable resource, and it’s part of the magical process.
I’ve also invited you to join the Organizing your Grimoire eCourse which you can do by going to maggiehaseman.com/organizing-your-grimoire.
Wait, don’t go yet!
Thanks for hanging out with me today. If you’ve enjoyed this post of Talk Witchcraft, I invite you to check out mumblesacademy.com.
Mumbles Academy is the place to be for intuitive souls at any stage on their WitchPath. Whether you are a Wildling at the very beginning of your witchcraft journey and looking for a safe learning environment, a Creator who is already committed to your practice and wants to develop your witchcraft skills even more, or a Sage who full of wisdom already and is ready to share that with others, Mumbles Academy was designed for you.
With monthly masterclasses and live Q&As, an extensive archive of courses and training, and a supportive community to help you along the way with encouragement and advice, Mumbles Academy is the perfect place for you to be as you as you continue on your WitchPath.
Now it’s your turn!
Share why you keep a grimoire below.
