Cunningham - Cunninghams Magical Sampler

About the Author

Scott Cunningham practiced magic actively for over twenty years. He was the author of more than fifty books covering both fiction and non-fiction subject matter; sixteen of his titles are published by Llewellyn Publications. Scotts books reflect a broad range of interests within the New Age sphere, where he was very highly regarded. He passed from this life on March 28, 1993, after a long illness.

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Cunninghams Magical Sampler 2012 by Scott Cunningham.

Articles by Scott Cunningham were first published in Llewellyns Magical Almanac from 1990 to 1993. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Llewellyn Publications, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

As the purchaser of this e-book, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. The text may not be otherwise reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or recorded on any other storage device in any form or by any means.

Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the authors copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

First e-book edition 2012

E-book ISBN: 9780738734798

Book design by Bob Gaul

Cover illustration: Patrick McEvoy

Editing by Ed Day

Interior art: Part pages Trees & Leaves, Dover Publications, New York, 2004

Article Illustrations Chris Down (pages )

All other art Clipart.com

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Llewellyn Publications does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publishers website for links to current author websites.

Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

by Raymond Buckland

Personal Power and Growth

Instruction and Applied Magic

Remedies of
the Wise Women

Herbs and Food

Nature and Earth Power

Ancient Cultures and Lore

by Donald Michael Kraig

Foreword

Back in 1990, Llewellyn Publications decided to publish an annual Magical Almanac and I was asked to edit it. It promised to be a lot of fun, with the whole world of magic open to us. I hoped to get articles from the wide range of authors who produced books for the publisher. Alas, they were very slow in getting on board. The result was that I ended up writing much of the first issue myself! But slowly and surely the Magical Almanac gained ground and it wasnt long before I had a wide variety of articles from which to choose each year.

From the beginning, however, there was always one fellow author I could count onScott Cunningham. He and I lived not far from one another, in San Diego, and were good friends. We had similar interests and, as it happened, a similar sense of humor! I always knew that if I ran short of material, and the deadline was drawing near, I could give Scott a call and hed produce something for me. Dressing With Power, Magic in Hawaii, Yule Lore, The Magical Teacher, Magic and Technology, The Magical Pantry, A Snow Spell, and Spells were all articles of Scotts that appeared in the first couple of editions.

The Magical Almanac grew in popularity over the years. I continued as editor for the first three years and then, in 1993, Scott joined me and we became co-editors. When introducing him to the readership at that time I stated, Hes happiest when reading or writing, but can be impossible to get off the phone! I also noted that Scott had a collection of hermit crabs. For that edition Robin Wood also joined us as designer and her artistic sense made a big improvement to the almanac.

Scott wrote the introduction for that 1993 Almanac and in it he said, The shadowy realm of magic has always had its share of adherents, in all ages. Unchained by rigidly mundane thought, magicians carve their futures with timeless spells, working with the powers of the Earth, Sun, Moon, the planets, and the elements to create positive change. Forging their lives with the forces of nature and their own energies, such magicians (power workers) discover that life is a series of opportunities undreamt of by most of their peers. Scott was himself most certainly one of those power workers.

Raymond Buckland

Personal Power and Growth

Dressing with Power

(Scott Cunningham defines magic as the projection of
natural but subtle energies to produce needed change.
This article is the result of his ongoing investigation into
the ways that we can bring magic into our daily lives.)

These days theres much talk about power lunches, power cars, and power colors for clothes. The premise behind thisthe image you present will help you move up in the worldhas nothing to do with this article. Power, here, is seen as the real thingthe juice that fuels magic. All things that exist, including color, contain energy. Because clothing is colored, it can be used for magical purposes just as can crystals, herbs, music, food, and virtually anything else.

This is an age-old practice. An excellent example of the special uses of clothing today are the robes worn by some ritual magicians and Wiccans (Witches). These are usually hooded, made of natural fibers, and worn solely for ritual purposes. They may be embroidered with specific designs or left plain. Such robes are usually donned to awaken the magical personality of the practitioner in order to prepare his or her consciousness at every level for the rite to be performed.

Thats all very well and good, but our everyday clothing presents us with powerful possibilities for improving our lives, for shaping our future into more positive experiences. Anyone can practice clothing magic and, indeed, the art of dressing can be a magical one.

First, the color of the clothes we wearboth those that can be seen by others as well as those that cannotis of vital importance. Just as colors in our environment affect us, so too do the colors of our apparel. Some general ideas regarding the colors of clothing and their magical effects follow, but a few words are appropriate here:

• To bring a specific colors influence into your life, be aware of it. Look at your clothing during the day and feel its energy seeping inside you. Make dressing itself a ritual. As you slip on the first garment of the color youve chosen to help you, visualize that power becoming a part of you. Accept it.
• You neednt wear an entire outfit of a single color. As long as some of your clothing is of the needed color, it can work its magic. (If, for example, a man would feel uncomfortable wearing pink, simply wear it where it wont be seenundershirts, socks, etc.)