Kelley Knight - Spells for the Modern Mystic: A Ritual Guidebook and Spell-Casting Kit

R ITUAL MAGICK IS EXPERIENTIAL. ITS HARD for most people to believe that they can affect their future through some candles and a chant, until they follow the steps provided with determination and then see the desired job, partner, or healing show up in their lives. Thats what happened for us. Weve both completely transformed our lives through ritual and have guided thousands of other ritualists to do the same, so we know it works.

Brandon and I met each other more than a decade ago when we worked with a group focused on transformation through a mix of gestalt therapy, Buddhist studies, and energy work. Brandon had recently returned from Peru, where hed spent weeks with shamans rehabilitating his body after a car accident had left him unable to walk for months. He hobbled into the Amazon with a cane and walked out fully healed. He felt his true power through the plant medicine he encountered in Peru, and he started seeking other means to harness that power again, which led him to the in-depth study of ritual magick.

For my part, I was working through some family issues that kept me feeling numb and unsatisfied with life. I was in my midtwenties and had all the trappings of successa high-paying job, a condo, a boyfriendbut I still had this pang, this feeling, that there was more to life. After a year or so of intensive healing work, I quit the job, dumped the boyfriend, sold everything, and moved to New York City. I traveled back to Atlanta every few months to continue working with the transformation group, and it was during this time I created the . I did the ritual myself for 365 dayswhich meant no dating whatsoever. Toward the end of my dating fast, I developed a deep friendship with Brandon, who was living in Tennessee at the time, through phone calls and the groups weekend-long retreats. Shortly after I completed the ritual, Brandon and I started dating; it felt like the real thing, so we both moved to Atlanta to nurture our relationship.

We each continued our efforts with the group, too. After about three years of work, I had an abrupt psychic awakening. As my intuitive abilities suddenly increased, I began to feel more excited about life. Eventually I was able to quit my day job and use those abilities professionally as both a tarot reader and a healer. I opened a small studio above a hair salon and worked with clients one-on-one. It was through this work that I realized there wasnt an approachable local store to which I could direct people to purchase the healing tools they neededand with that, the seeds for the shop were planted. During this time, Brandon was working on the leadership team at our neighborhood Whole Foods. He was managing his team and selling wellness products by day, and studying and doing his ritual practice at night.

After Brandon and I got married I felt as if I had made it. It felt great to be married to a man who shared my beliefs and loved to grow as much as I did. I was making a living doing meaningful work helping people. I was connecting with Spirit and had access to a rich yet unseen world around me. So imagine my surprise when I got hit with a debilitating depression.

It came on slowly. Getting to my readings took more effort, and I went straight to bed after work. Over a period of a few weeks, the depression intensified. I was rescheduling my sessions, because leaving the house felt impossible. A few weeks later, I closed my books, because the overwhelming backlog made me feel worse, and I honestly didnt know if I would ever be able to do this work again. Brandon literally had to carry me into therapy and sit with me in each session. My mind told me this was my new normal and that I would feel this way forever.

After about three months, Brandon suggested I do the because I thought that I had a connection to Spirit without the need for spells, but I was fraught enough to give it a shot.

On a full moon, I performed the steps, pouring myself into the mantraAll my roads are open, all my blocks are unblockedfor a couple of hours as the candles burned. The next morning my depression lifted. Within a few days, a client offered us the seed money to open Modern Mystic Shop. A week later, we secured the real estate. Within six weeks after that, we were open for business. Even though I had done years of work on myself and others, it was ritual magick that launched both of us into a new life.

Today, we work together running Modern Mystic Shop, a successful metaphysical store in Atlanta. Each of us does what we love most: I select and create the merchandise that lines the shelves, maintain the public brand and persona, and work on expansion opportunities for the business. Brandon leads and inspires the amazing Modern Mystic Shop team and helps create one-of-a-kind experiences for every customer who walks through the doors. Weve created a community space where those seeking guidance can learn how to connect more deeply with their intuition.

The foundation of this life for both of us is our personal spiritual practice, which includes ritual and altar work. Brandon is now a master ritualist, creating spells for himself, his clients, and this book. A ritualist in my own right, Im a dedicated Kundalini yoga practitioner and tarot expert, and I weave spell work into my everyday life; this is why I identify as a modern mystic. These practices dont just help us maintain the status quo, they assist us in expanding and creating opportunities for everyone around us.

Brandon and I are not special. We hear transformation stories from customers all over the world who perform our rituals.

How does this type of profound change happen? First, ritual gives people the ability to create their reality consciously rather than let their unconscious mind steer them along. In other words, more often than not, most people allow their beliefs, traumas, and conditioned responses to inform the experience they have of life. With ritual, conscious desires are brought into focus; the ritual itself, which often includes self-hypnosis and imaginative visualizations, bypasses the self-sabotaging nature of the unconscious mind and changes ones beliefs. Insane belief is a key ingredient to ritual work, as it is the strength of your belief that fuels your determination not only to perform a ritual in full but also to give yourself over to the outcome once you complete it.

Second, ritual engages with the astral plane, or the spiritual world. Partnering with spirit allies that reside in the astral plane enhances a ritual practice. Working with ancestors, angels, deities, planets, and daemons is a way to draw on their power and expertise to amplify results. Before the advent of Abrahamic religionschiefly Christianity, Judaism, and Islamit wasnt frowned on to connect with myriad spirits, including both angels and daemons. Once the Abrahamic religions took hold, evil came to be classified as anything outside their understanding of God and Gods will. While daemons could be classified as fallen angels, in reality they were not cast out of heaven like the Old Testament suggests. They were angels who chose to fall, or be closer to the earthly dimension to be in service to humanity. Like angels, daemons are powerful and helpful, which is why both beings are partnered with in this book. However, if youre uncomfortable with any of the spirits used in a ritual, then simply skip those spells. There is plenty of ritual work here that doesnt work with spirits at all.

Its also important to note that any religious beliefs you have will be transposed on your ritual practice. Say you were raised Catholic but no longer practice or believe in Jesus; nonetheless, what you have learned from the Bible about daemons or magick may make you uncomfortable when approaching spell work. This is normal, and any fears you have will help illuminate your embedded beliefsand its your choice whether to address them. This is why experiencing is more important than reading. Try a spell and have the experience. Its the easiest way to rewrite old religious programming that may no longer serve you. Perhaps youre religious and want to try ritual work, but some of the spells go against your beliefs. Just think of ritual as an advanced form of prayer, which it is.