Reclaiming Eros in Magic: My Story & Ways to Reclaim Yours

Three years ago, I had an experience that I knew I would share one day, and I couldn’t fathom sharing it for most of the last three years. But today is that day. While it still feels vulnerable, I trust that it’s important for me to share it. 

This story needs to be told not because it is unique, but because it is common. Yet, it’s something that many choose not to or feel unsafe to talk about, which is exactly how I felt for a long time. 

The truth is, what I’m going to share is as fundamental as eating, drinking, birthing, and dying–it’s in your genes. It’s your ability to be present with your most innate and primal power, the power of your erotic and sensual energy. 

This is not about sex and orgasm, although they can certainly interweave. When I speak to the erotic here, it is as one of my teachers, Kalah Hill, would say, our origin story. Your erotic and sensual desires point to why we are here today. It is where we all came from, and that is a powerful concept.

Eros is your sense of desire and capacity to access pleasure in your sensorial body, whether it’s a full-bodied walk through a forest where every one of your senses comes alive and erupts into bliss, or physical intimacy with a partner, it’s all eros. 

Here’s my homecoming story to my body, pleasure, and erotic power. You’ll also find some ways to start exploring this work and how you might want to incorporate it into your practice. If you want to do a deep dive, join me in a 2-hour live workshop here. 

It’s a “Kundalini” awakening!

Some will read this story and say, “You had a Kundalini awakening!”. If that’s the language you would use, I want to challenge you to think broader (unless it is a part of your cultural and ancestral practice). Kundalini is a Hindu term that describes the coiled, primordial life force residing at the base of the spine. Like many practices, the term “Kundalini awakening” is yet another that has been misused and appropriated by people outside the culture. 

As is often the case when terms are appropriated outside of their culture of origin (beyond the harm of cultural appropriation), it causes a separation from one's own cultural and ancestral inheritance. 

While the phrase ‘Kundalini’ is unique to Hinduism, erotic energy and the unique ways it manifests in each person are not. After having this experience, I devoted myself to discovering how these practices were incorporated into my ancestral traditions and how others continue to work with them today. 

This is how my erotic awakening occurred and how it led me to explore my ancestral inheritance of working with this sensual and primordial energy. 

A Homecoming to my Body and my Power

A past mentor instructed me to journey to the lower world. I didn’t think much of it because I had made lower world journeys in the past. This time was different. It was the Leo full moon, and when I entered the cave pathway into the lower world, I was met by an older female ancestor whom I’d worked with in the past. She had something to share. 

She instructed me to begin rocking my pelvis forward and backward. While this was a little out of the ordinary compared to past journeys I’d experienced and past interactions with this ancestor, I was in the lower world, so ordinary doesn’t really apply. Because this was a trusted ancestor I’d worked with in the past, I did as she said.

Within minutes of moving my pelvis back and forth, an explosion of erotic energy cracked open in my pelvic bowl. The ancestor was loving but firm in her direction. She wanted me to continue with various pelvic motions and stay with the intense energy coursing through me. While I did my best, the intensity was so great that after a few minutes, I shifted into different positions, moving from standing to lying down and then sitting on my knees. 

I was able to stay engaged by focusing on the drum beat and my breathing. Even though part of me did not know what was going on, I knew I had to surrender to the experience.

I completely lost track of time, but the realization that people in other offices were within earshot of me did make its way into my mind (this happened when I had an office and storefront in Arizona). While the orgasmic energy coursing through my body was extremely intense, I could tell there was more. I knew I had to surrender even more and that it was going to be loud when I did.  

When I surrendered, I felt energy shoot up from my pelvic bowl into my heart. A primal yell escaped my mouth without my permission, and orgasmic shock waves radiated out of my heart with such force that it sent me falling backwards. Heaving on the floor, I had just experienced the most intense full-bodied orgasm of my life, fully clothed and without physical touch.

An Extended Afterglow and Shame

As I lay on the floor, I was simultaneously blissed out, confused, and a little ashamed. It was unlike any usual orgasm I’d ever experienced; I wasn’t even sure if it was an orgasm. I was fully clothed, didn’t touch myself, but felt orgasmic bliss radiating out of my body at a level of intensity I’d never experienced. Not to mention my vulva continued to vibrate with pleasure for days after.

I’d heard of a kundalini awakening before, but it wasn’t a part of my practice. I also knew this was something different, or at least something with a different name, because it was a European ancestor who guided me through this experience. 

As I navigated life with my body buzzing and my vulva still on fire, my head was spinning. While walking around with a permanent orgasmic buzz might sound enticing, as an overworked new mom of twin 2-year-olds running a business, it was jarring.

Over a week’s time, the intense sensations I experienced eventually stabilized in my body as I slowly metabolized this experience. Fortunately, this experience was not the end of my story, just the beginning. 

This experience encouraged me to confront aspects of myself that had been overlooked. I was able to face my relationship with pleasure, sex, desire, and my body with a fresh perspective. If you think herbalism and spellwork are suppressed, watch out because the suppression, erasure, and vilification of erotic energy, pleasure, and sex is (no shock) truly impressive. I now understand that it was by design that I felt shame after this experience. It’s also why so many feel uncomfortable talking about these kinds of experiences, pleasure, and erotic power. 

As you’ll learn, if you explore these parts of yourself, reclaiming your erotic power is political, radical, and liberatory. I am certainly not the first to share this; Black women and femmes, like adrienne maree brown and Audre Lorde, have been leading this work for decades. 

Reclaiming My Erotic Power

In the last three years of integrating this experience and learning more about my erotic power directly from my body, working with my ancestors in journey states, and with the help of others guiding this work, I’ve begun the life-long process of reclaiming this part of my ancestral inheritance and magical practice. 

My experience and the ensuing exploration it spurred changed every facet of my life. It brought a sensorial awareness into my life that I didn’t know was available to me. I have access to entirely new states of consciousness and ways to feel and move energy as a result of intentionally incorporating my erotic power into my practice. My senses are more heightened, and my entire practice is transformed.

Reclaiming this part of my practice extends far beyond energy and magic. It has positively affected my mental, physical, and emotional health. It uncovered my queerness, pansexuality, and femme-ness. My connection to my erotic power continues to liberate me from an overculture that only wants me to produce and perform within the confines of cis, het, and patriarchal parameters. 

The changes that unfold in you as a result of exploring your erotic power will be unique to you and likely look very different than mine. You likely have practices in your ancestral lineage to connect you with your body, pleasure, and power. I think we all do. 

Reclaiming Your Erotic Power

What I don’t want you to walk away with here is that you need to have some explosive and mystical experience to explore this work or claim your erotic power. You don’t, or maybe yours will or did look completely different from mine.

I believe that the practices that open these sensorial channels were once standard, taught, and shared between generations. Just like my wise ancestor taught me in this journey.  I believe that in our past (and still today in some places), these experiences didn’t happen in isolation, but were coordinated and deeply held by elders in the community who understood the power of erotic energy. 

There are many paths to reclaiming your erotic power, and there are, in fact, many leading this work, but it can take some digging (remember that suppression I mentioned earlier). How you decide to navigate your journey into this realm will be a personal choice. 

Remember, erotic energy lives within your body. While you might feel intrigued to learn from others, it is not necessary. Your body is your best teacher. 

As someone with European ancestry, challenges to exploring this work presented quickly due to the Inquisition and the burning times, which caused extreme suppression of anything deemed heretical, especially erotic power in women. While I have read and learned from others, much of my exploration into this realm has been through self-exploration, spiritual journeying, and working with my ancestors.

There are lineages where this work has remained intact through the generations, like Tantra and Daoism. While these are the lenses through which much of this work is presented, I believe these practices were/are alive in all of us.

As with any craft that’s been deemed inappropriate by a patriarchal, white-supremacist over-culture, getting to the root of the matter will likely be a unique and winding path. 

Bringing Erotic Power into Your Practice

Here are some gentle ways to begin exploring this realm. Here are some starting points. Get more details about these in my upcoming workshop, Reclaiming Eros in Magic. 

• Take some time to be with the topics of pleasure, your body, and sex. What does it bring up for you? What excites you? What makes you uncomfortable? Journal about it or have conversations with others whom you feel safe talking about these topics.

• Explore possible trauma with your body, pleasure, and sex. This may require the assistance of a trained professional, depending on your personal experiences. The books Sacred Sex by Gabriela Herstik or Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown can be supportive places to start. 

• Carve out regular time to be with and engage your sensorial body (solo and/or with a partner). This doesn’t have to be sexual, although it can be, but could be as simple as going for a walk and engaging your senses.

• Explore the elements (air, fire, water, earth) through your senses. For example, to work with the earth element, grab a rose or your favorite flower and engage with it through your senses. Smell it, gently brush it over your face and body. 

• If working with your ancestors or guides is part of your practice, approach them with curiosity about this work and how you might explore it. 

• Read or listen to folks who have led this work or are leading this work. Here are some of my favorites: Sacred Sex by Gabriela Herstik, Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown, Mysteries of the Dark Moon by Demetra George, the essay Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power by Audre Lorde, and Witches, Witch-hunting, and Women by Silvia Federici. 

I’m not here to present myself as an expert, but I do want to create spaces where talking about pleasure, erotic energy, and how it pertains to magic is more accessible and trauma-informed. My goal in sharing all of this is to help normalize it, especially for mid-life and aging women, femmes, non-binary folks, moms, and caregivers who, like me, maybe feel like this realm isn’t for them. 

Eros and pleasure are for everyone, and I’d argue we need them now more than ever. 

Have a similar story, or did something in this resonate?a I’d love to hear about it. If you want to explore this more, I hope to see you in the live workshop or the replay, where we’ll discuss the story of Lillith and how she relates to this work, history, and practices to begin exploring your erotic energy. 

In Care, Cassie

Deepen Your Intuition by Building a Personal Intuitive Language

If you're reading this, you likely already have a relationship with your intuition, but what happens when you're ready to go past gut feelings? So much of what's available online and in books skim the surface of what it means to be in touch with your intuition. 

As global changes continue to stir and we move deeper into unknown times, having a robust relationship with your intuition will help you navigate these times. 

Knowing your gut feelings is essential, but it's just the tip of the iceberg when working with your intuition. Is it time to deepen your intuition into a full-fledged intuitive language? 

Working with an intuitive language is something many mediums rely on, but don't let this scare you away. You do not have to be a medium to utilize this essential intuitive skill. I've created a system to make crafting your intuitive language accessible, whether you're just getting started or already have a well-honed intuition. 

In this blog, you'll learn:

• What an intuitive language is 

• How building your own can help deepen your ability to navigate life and relationships with your guides and magical allies

• How to start creating your unique, intuitive language

• An example of what an intuitive language can look like in real life

Do you already know you want to go deeper and learn practices to create your intuitive language? Explore my in-depth workshop, Building an Intuitive Language in the Craft Your Own Magic Circle membership here to access the class, or grab a drop-in class pass to attend live and get the replay here. 

What is an Intuitive Language?

A personal, intuitive language lets you dialogue intuitively with your spirit (higher self, oversoul, whatever term you prefer), spirit guides, magical allies, ancestors, deities, etc. But keep your mind wide open. I'm using words like "language" and "dialogue" here as metaphors. Communicating with your intuitive language will differ from chatting with your bestie. 

Having an intuitive language is unlike learning French or Spanish; I can't just teach you my language. Building your intuitive language will be unique because we each receive and process intuitive information uniquely and have different associations with feelings and images. Sure, some people might have a similar language to you, but it's like a fingerprint; yours is unique. 

An intuitive language enables you to go beyond binary "yes" and "no" dialogue with your intuition. While establishing a “yes” and “no” communication is an integral part of the process I lay out for you here, adding additional vocabulary is also essential.

Having an intuitive language allows you to decipher the subtleties of intuitive communication more clearly and accurately. 

While building your intuitive language will help you navigate life, the goal isn't to utilize it as a spiritual vending machine. Having an intuitive language doesn't mean you'll suddenly know how to navigate every moment of life perfectly. Even with a robust, intuitive language, aspects of your life and this world will remain in flux in ways that won't allow you to gain definitive advice. Some details will always belong to the Great Mystery of life. 

I'll share an example of my intuitive language later in this post, but for it to make more sense first, let's cover why you'd want to do this and how to get started creating your intuitive language. 

Why Create an Intuitive Language? 

Creating your unique intuitive language isn't just about gaining insights about how to navigate your life. It's about knowing yourself better and understanding the depth of variety in which intuition can express itself (in yourself and others). But it goes beyond this. 

Creating a unique, intuitive language allows you to form genuine and reciprocal relationships with your closest magical and spiritual allies. 

Think about some of your closest relationships, friends, family, or animal beloveds. What's your communication like with them? You probably have a deep rapport with them, perhaps even unique ways you communicate that only happen between you and that beloved. 

When you focus on your ability to communicate with your spiritual and magical allies, your relationship naturally deepens. 

By learning how to communicate better via intuition, you create an environment that leads to deeper relationships, creating a cyclical loop of understanding and deepening. 

When you communicate intuitively regularly with your closest spiritual and magical allies, it will come naturally to you, and your ability to understand your intuition will happen more automatically. 

5 Steps to Build Your Unique Intuitive Language

When building your unique intuitive language, understanding how intuition manifests in your body (subtle and physical) and how it feels is key. You might already have a great foundation with this. If so, great, skip to step two! If not, start with step one below to learn more about the "clairs".

1. Understanding your dominant "clairs"

This will give you a place to focus when learning what intuition feels like in your body. Think clairsentience (clear feeling), clairvoyance (clear seeing), clairaudience (clear hearing), etc. Check out a past blog post where I break these down in greater detail here. While the clairs aren't the only way to understand how intuitive information lands in your body, it's a great starting point. 

2. Practice noticing how your intuition shows up and feels in your body 

Understanding your clairs points you toward where and what to pay attention to. Practicing listening, feeling, seeing, and knowing how your intuition shows up makes sensing it more automatic. Like learning any language, understanding how these sensations arrive in your body without spending a lot of time questioning is part of the process. Think of this step as an intuitive bootcamp. At this point, what's most important is recognizing how intuition feels in your body instead of focusing on how accurate you are. Building up your accuracy comes later. 

Here are some simple ways to start weaving intuitive practices into your day. Lean into your most dominant clair sense for each one. 

• Tune into your intuition each morning to ask for any insights or guidance for the day.

• The next time you need to make a decision that won't have a long-lasting or serious consequence (like deciding which direction to walk or what to have for dinner), check in with your intuition.

• Practice pulling tarot or oracle cards for yourself or others, and don't rely on the guidebook. 

• Tune into your intuition each night before bed to ask if there's anything you missed during your day that would be important to know.
  

3. Create a “yes” and “no” communication system

Once you understand what your intuition feels like in your body, start practicing a simple "yes"/"no communication system with your intuition to begin strengthening your communication muscles. I share some simple techniques for this in my book, Craft Your Own Magic, and will also share them in the Building an Intuitive Language workshop here. Essentially, you'll need to discern what an intuitive "yes" vs "no" is like in your body; again, this will be different for everyone. 

4. Form relationships with your guides, ancestors, or magical allies

To practice any language, having someone or something to communicate with will be helpful. Now, it's time to build a relationship with a spirit guide, magical ally (plant, tree, crystal, etc.), God, Goddess, or ancestor. If this sounds like a big leap from step three, grab my free guided journey to connect with a spirit guide here to get started. Start practicing your "yes" and "no" communication with a being of your choice and notice how it feels in your body.

5. Incorporate an inner circle of correspondences to form your intuitive vocabulary 

Moving your intuitive language beyond a "yes" and "no" system will require understanding what I call your "inner circle" of spiritual and magical allies. For some, myself included, these are the four elements and four cardinal directions. Feel free to borrow my inner circle if you're not sure what yours is yet, and don't worry; you can always change it later. 

Your inner circle is the birthplace of your intuitive vocabulary. Understanding how each energy in your inner circle appears in your body creates your intuitive vocabulary. For example, suppose you're getting to know a new plant, and you receive an intuitive insight that reminds you of something in your inner circle that aligns with themes of openness and curiosity. In that case, that plant is likely sharing that its energy is one of openness and curiosity.

Apply the same intuitive communication principles in the previous steps to incorporate your inner circle of correspondences into your intuitive language. 

Want more guidance? I share practices and a more in-depth look at this step in my workshop Building an Intuitive Language here, which you can also access in my membership here. 

Keep reading for an example of how I utilized my intuitive language in a recent experience. 

What an Intuitive Language Can Look Like in Action

Here's an example of how working with my intuitive language has been helpful recently. I sensed a need to build some quiet time to journey, a practice of spiritually traveling to different planes of existence and times. This initial nudge is what people often refer to as the gut feeling. My intuition got my attention. 

Here's where my unique intuitive language starts to come into play. Leaning on my intuitive language enabled me to discern what the journey was about, so I could decide if it was something I wanted to do. 

Based on the feelings in my body that I associate with the element of earth, I could tell the need to journey was rooted in something ancestral. In my practice, I associate the ancestral realms with the cardinal direction north and the earth element. 

I also saw pink roses in my mind, indicating that this ancestral journey pertained to my mother line because I associate pink roses with my mother line. 

I could also sense an intense fire energy around this invitation to connect with ancestors in my mother line. Coming up on a full moon in Leo, I knew fire would likely be very present, and the messages I needed to receive were likely quite intense. 

Journeying on the Leo full moon felt aligned. The ancestor in my mother line made herself known immediately. What came up was intense, but I was prepared. Our work together resulted in ancestral healing on my mother line, and I began noticing shifts and changes within myself and my family members within days. 

Start Building Your Intuitive Language

As the example above illustrates, building an intuitive language can make connecting with your intuition easier to understand and more approachable. Other benefits include connecting with plants and crystals, performing rituals or energy work, receiving insights from your guides, and more. 

While I have dedicated years to honing my intuitive language, I did much of it alone. I do this work to help you skip over some of the trial and error I went through. How different could this world be if more people could tune into their intuition from a deeply grounded and embodied place? The potential is incredible and positive. This is why I want to see you communicating intuitively with a well-honed and robust intuitive language. 

Did you find some new avenues to navigate building your intuitive language? I hope so. If you want to dig deeper, I'd love to see you in the Craft Your Own Magic Circle, where you can access this class or get the class on its own here.

Deep care,

Cassie

Reframing Energy Clearing to Claim Energetic Accountability

You know how this story goes: light up your herb of choice or grab your selenite, wave it around, and PRESTO, the energy is clear. While this narrative is standard in many spiritual and magical spaces, it lacks the nuance and know-how to do much and can even be harmful.

Like so much floating around in spiritual, wellness, and magical spaces, the art of energy clearing has suffered tremendously at the hands of capitalism and other harmful systems.

By commodifying such a sacred practice, we've also lost its magic and subtlety.

It's not hard to look around now and see that this plane is undergoing massive transformations. Yes, it's intense right now, but this is precisely why I want you to be aware of your energetic field and fully in your power.

Instead of stopping at "I need to clear my energy," let's mine down deeper to discover what's underneath—a call to take accountability for your energy and find the gold hidden within you.

So, What is Energy Clearing?

First, it's important to note that energy clearing varies culturally and from practice to practice. If what I share doesn't resonate with your practice, that's okay. As always, come with an open mind, take what you like, and leave the rest!

Energy clearing is a vague phrase that means different things to people based on their practice and ancestry, so it's hard to define concisely. Many folks think of energy clearing as a technique to remove unwanted energy.

I prefer the phrase energy tending or maintenance because energy clearing is nuanced and usually needs to go beyond removing energy.

Does Energy Clearing Work?

The art and practice of energy clearing is absolutely a real and powerful practice. However, the need for energy clearing is often misidentified and misused. Why?

Not every uncomfortable feeling can or should be removed from your energetic field.

Of course, this isn't always the case, but it points to the truth that the cause of our discomfort is often nuanced, layered, and personal.

Think of a time when you experienced a difficult situation only to discover it was exactly what needed to happen because it clarified something, opened a new pathway, or provided a valuable lesson.

Oftentimes, what you feel inclined to clear away is an invitation to pause and go deeper, especially if it’s a sensation you find yourself wanting to clear away regularly.

Here’s the reframe: most energetic tending is energy balancing, not clearing.

The good news: real, powerful, and transformative ways to shift, balance, transmute, and clear your energy do exist.

They're not all quick fixes, and some require training or permission, but there are many things you can do to take your energetic well-being into your own hands today.

Let's get into this.

Energy Clearing vs. Balancing

In most cases, it's not a person, place, or situation causing harm to your energy; it's your response or reaction to them.

Clearing your energy or cutting cords from your field will usually do little to nothing. A more pressing and helpful approach is addressing the imbalances in your energetic field caused by your response to other people and situations.

This doesn't mean that bad actors and harmful systems don't exist. They 100% exist and cause harm on all levels, but trying to clear them away will be a constant game of whack-a-mole.

What I'm inviting in here is energetic accountability rather than an energetic blame game.

Next time you think, "So-and-so's vibes were off, so I need to clear it away." What would it feel like to approach it like this, "Wow. I had a response to so-and-so's energy. Let me investigate that."

Maybe after investigating a response to another person, you discover a wound within yourself that doesn’t require energy clearing but requires the soothing aid of water, or the grounding safety of earth to bring you back into a place of balance. (side note: eternal perfect balance isn’t the goal either, it’s the awareness of when you’re off balance and knowing how to come back.)

This approach requires accountability, time, possibly outside support, boundaries, and honest introspection.

When you focus on taking accountability for your energy, you get to identify the parts of you that need tending, better understand your energy, and work with it in ways that allow you to claim your personal power, and not the gross power over kind, but power with.

When you prioritize being aware of your energy and balancing it, it keeps you in your power.

Any good magician or healer knows that facing their shadows is necessary for healing or transformation to occur. Attempting to clear away every uncomfortable feeling won't work and skips over potential gold within you.

When to Use Energy Clearing

You might be wondering if energy clearing has a place. It does, and it's a practice I utilize with myself and others.

Energy clearing works wonders for residual energy, the energy you pick up in busy places, or maybe an old house with a lot of sticky energy hanging around. It can also work for entity removals and exorcisms, but these are very involved practices requiring training and/or permission.

Energy clearing won't help with the habitual personal, ancestral, and societal patterns that may have deep grooves in your energetic field or the soul lessons you might need to walk through.

Keep reading to understand more about the 4 key energy maintenance concepts I lean on in my energy maintenance practice with myself and clients.

4 Key Energy Maintenance Concepts

The good news is that countless energy maintenance methods and techniques are available, and you don't have to do it alone. Maybe the tips I share here will be enough to get you started. Or, you decide to take my Reframing Energy Clearing class here or work with me or someone else one-on-one.

An energy worker or healer can bring light to these things and begin the energetic balancing process. However, experiencing long-lasting energy healing will require honest introspection, which can take time, and sometimes, multi-pronged support (this is why I stopped offering single energy work sessions). To receive lasting results from energy work (outside of the rare Mary Magdalene, Buddha, and Jesus situations) requires an in-depth and honest process.

I approach the practice of energy maintenance through the lens of the four elements (earth, air, fire, and water), which provides common ground for many practices and is the lens from which I work.

Here are four key concepts to help you understand the basics of performing regular energy tending.

1. Assess what types of energies are present, e.g., residual, collective, personal, ancestral, etc.

2. Identify how each energy present best corresponds with an element (earth, air, fire, water)

3. Determine what approach is needed, e.g., clearing, balancing, transmuting, protecting, etc.

4. Build or utilize reciprocal and ethical relationships with practices to carry out the needed approach(es)

Energy Clearing is One of Many Tools

Considering these four key energy maintenance concepts, it makes sense that a simple wave of a selenite wand might not always do the trick when tending to your energy body. (Side note: this is 100% not a dig at selenite. Selenite is AMAZING, especially regarding energy work, but there are helpful steps that can make working with it more reciprocal and effective.)

The next time you reach for the herbal wand or crystal for a quick energy cleanse, pause, take a breath, and see if anything else wants your attention or if a different approach would better support you.

You deserve better than playing the energetic blame games. It's time to take full accountability for your energy, and I want to see you fully in your power.

Thank you for being here! If you enjoyed this post, share it with someone else who might enjoy it, or get in touch and let me know your thoughts. Join the Reframing Energy Clearing class here, and I’d love to see you in the Craft Your Own Magic Membership, where you’ll find monthly classes and much more.

Deep care,

Cassie