Write Day and Night Like It’s Going Out of Style

I’ve started working on my Book again. You know, The Book. The thing in which one writes down all the everything.

I don’t know what to call it – Book of Shadows isn’t my thing, grimoire isn’t quite right – but I’m always scared that I’ll screw it up somehow. I had to get the ARC thing from Staples – that modular system where you can change things around. Like a binder, but it still looks nice. I can’t copy things into a journal that looks nice. Not yet.

My handwriting is garbage and my practice is disorganized, to say the least. I’m not a Pinterest Witch and I probably never will be, as much as I want to be. I love seeing people’s beautiful books and setups, and I like how my altars and shrines are set up, but my Book is going to be…well, it’s going to be a little scattered.

Much like myself.

I’m going to try and do something with it every day, whether it’s writing down impromptu rituals or copying down notes I’ve taken on my phone about Spicy Astral Tomfuckery. I want to do more sigils, too.

A friend of mine has said that I have a fear of failure. She’s absolutely right. I 100% cannot let myself fuck up, which honestly explains a good deal about me. That’s why I can’t use any of the nice journals I have. I’m sure it goes back to when I was a kid and told I had to be perfect, or impressed upon that I had to be perfect, or…something. Something of the sort. Gotta be perfect.

Which is why I haven’t even been working on this Book. I’ve been scared I’ll mess it up somehow. Which is silly – how can I mess up something I’m doing for my own enrichment? It’s not like I’m obligated to show it to anyone.

But there is something I wrote in the Book, first thing, because it’s informed my practice and my life since I was a preteen:

In Life’s name and for Life’s sake,

I assert that I will employ the Art which is its gift in Life’s service alone, rejecting all other usages.

I will guard growth and ease pain. I will fight to preserve what grows and lives well in its own way; and I will change no object or creature unless its growth and life, or that of the system of which it is part, are threatened.

To these ends, in the practice of my Art, I will put aside fear for courage, and death for life, when it is right to do so — looking always towards the Heart of Time, where all our sundered times are one, and all our myriad worlds lie whole, in That from Which they proceeded.

It’s a version of the Wizard’s Oath from Diane Duane’s Young Wizards books, and it speaks to me in a way that few things do. I even plan to get the first few words tattooed on me, it means that much to me. In Life’s name, and for Life’s sake.

It means more than these words say – it means to fight entropy, to fight isfet, wherever I may find it. It means to protect those who need protection and to do what needs doing.

In the words of Lin-Manuel Miranda, “I don’t wanna fight, but I won’t apologize for doing what’s right.”

I’m trying not to fear failure anymore. I’m going to write in my Book. And I’m going to make it a record of who and what I am and how I operate. Disorganized or not, it won’t be a failure. Because it’s me, on paper. And I am not a failure.

I’m gonna be Hamilton, not Burr. I’m not gonna wait for it; I’m not throwing away my shot.

I’m gonna write like I’m running out of time.