with Althaea Sebastiani

In this episode of The Hermit’s Land podcast, I sit down with Althaea Sebastiani to dig into the heart of witchcraft—animism and spirit work. We explore what it means to walk this path with patience and authenticity. Learning to listen and truly hear will help you build deep relationships with spirits over time.

We get into the how-to of working with spirits and deities, discussing ways to practice outside formal or initiatory structures. This episode offers guidance on how to find the spirits where you live. We also dig into the responsibility of navigating cultural appropriation and engaging respectfully with Indigenous and other living traditions.

The conversation also covers spirit workers and teachers—the role they might play in your journey and how to decide if someone is truly trustworthy. With more sketchy folks gaining reach in the spiritual marketplace, discernment is more important than ever.

Finally, we remind listeners that spirituality doesn’t exist in a vacuum—the physical world still matters. Your health, well-being, and everyday life all shape your practice. Common sense is just as vital as intuition when walking a spiritual path.

If you’re looking to start practicing witchcraft, this episode will give you the pointers you need to begin. With patience and practice, you’ll be building solid relationships with the spiritual world in no time.

Listen to the episode on all the platforms. Or use the player below.

You can download the audio here.

You can find us on the socials. Or Althaea is here and Andrew is here.

Episodes with drop biweekly going forward. Help me let the world know I’m back by sharing on socials and leaving review on the platform on which you listen to us.

Much love

Andrew

PS

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Witchcraft and Animism

04:54 Starting Your Journey in Witchcraft

11:04 Engaging with Spirits and Deities

21:12 Navigating Appropriation and Authenticity in Practice

26:56 Personal Rituals and Nature Connection

28:57 Engaging with Indigenous Traditions

30:53 Understanding Living Traditions

32:21 The Role of Spirit Workers

34:29 Finding Authentic Spirit Workers

36:42 Navigating the Spiritual Marketplace

40:34 Cautions in Spiritual Practices

43:04 Balancing Spiritual and Physical Worlds

Transcript

Andrew McGregor (00:01)
Hey folks, welcome to another episode of the Hermit’s Land podcast. This one is Getting Started in Witchcraft. And as I was pondering who I wanted to have this kind of conversation with, Althaea came to mind. I know her from the internets and from watching their great work over many years now. And their perspective, I think, is a really great one.

it falls outside of sort of initiatory Wicca and that kind of witchcraft. We’ll get to that in some other episode and sort of goes more directly to working with spirits and things along those lines. So for folks who might not know you though, give us a quick intro.

Althaea (00:46)
Oh hi, my name is Althaea Sebastiani and I primarily serve the pagan and witchcraft communities as a spirit worker, as a priest, and as a teacher.

Like you said, my big focus is on helping other people embrace the deeper side of practice, helping them connect with the spirits of the land, with their ancestors, with the gods, and just kind of finding out how much more to the world there is than what we’ve kind of been led to believe. And spoilers, there’s a lot more. So it’s so much more, yeah.

Andrew McGregor (01:21)
So much more.

Yeah. Well, maybe let’s start with that, you know? I think you use the term animism. I definitely use the term animism for a lot of that kind of stuff. What’s that mean to you? What is that as a worldview or as a way of walking through the world?

Althaea (01:31)
Yeah.

goodness.

I mean, it’s huge because it’s a worldview. It’s not a practice. It’s not a religion in itself. It’s this way of perceiving and thus experiencing the world. So it’s part of your very being when you’re an animus, when you’re doing that, living that. The big thing is that it’s kind of…

It’s a way of embracing wholeness rather than seeing like the world, the universe, the cosmos, whatever you want to call it as being just physical or physical that we’re dealing with temporarily in pursuit of a greater spiritual. It’s embracing both. It’s experiencing, living and acknowledging, respecting both and both the physical world, the spirit world, but also the physical parts of ourselves and the spiritual parts of ourselves. It’s not putting

one in greater priority than the other. It’s that balance between them both, the wholeness, the way the one affects the other and vice versa.

Andrew McGregor (02:49)
Yeah, and at least in my perspective, extending that to everything, right? You know, everything around us is both material and spiritual. Everything around us, you know, has its own energy of sorts and…

Althaea (02:55)
Exactly, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Andrew McGregor (03:08)
you know, maybe not every single thing, but so many things have their own spirit attached to them. And if we engage with the worlds, you know, with the idea that everything that we are spending time around has its own living energy or consciousness to varying degrees, it really starts to shift the way in which we walk through the world, right?

Althaea (03:13)
Yeah.

exactly. Because if you can see the personhood of something like a spirit in your coffee cup, it’s really hard to not see, acknowledge, and embrace the personhood of other human beings, too. It really works to shift the way that you see things, the way you move through the world. And it’s a good way of creating little ripples of change, you know, especially kind of changes that we need right now.

Andrew McGregor (03:57)
Mm-hmm. For sure,

right? Yeah, and I think that, you know, talking about animism is a great way to start because, you know, I’ve sort of fallen on the term spirit-led magic as kind of what I refer to, the piece that’s most witchcraft-like. But, you know, I think that animism, you know, we could say that…

Althaea (04:06)
Radio.

Andrew McGregor (04:22)
for the kind of witchcraft that I understand you to practice, and I think a lot of people are excited about, starting with animism and building from there is kind of a big part of the practice, right?

Althaea (04:32)
Exactly.

yeah, yeah, fully agreed and that was kind of the big goal with my most recent book was kind of rebuilding witchcraft from the land off, know, using animism as that big foundation, the basic worldview that permeates and influences every other aspect of it.

Andrew McGregor (04:41)
Mm-hmm.

So where do people start with that? Someone’s out there thinking about, you know, I feel called to witchcraft. I feel called to engaging in the world in this sort of animist, or maybe they have a different word for it, but this sort of conscious relationship with other spirit beings. What’s the first step?

Althaea (05:15)
think a big thing is just holding yourself open to the possibility and the idea that the world as you know it

like the places that you frequent in your life, the experiences that you hold or that you have in those places, that there’s a lot more going on that you’re not aware of. And there’s a lot more that you could be experiencing in there. A lot of it comes down to a big mind shift, you know, with witchcraft. The practice changes us. It changes the way we see the world, the way we experience it. So kind of holding yourself open initially to accepting that who you are

right now is not who you’re going to be with even just six months of practice, know, a year of practice. You’re going to be different. And that’s going to be because of the experiences that you’ve had living in this world, practicing in this world. So just hold yourself open to the idea that there is more and you’re not currently seeing it, but you could be. And try to figure out what is the means of getting from where you are now to that place where you are seeing it, experiencing it. And that’s your reality.

Andrew McGregor (06:15)
Mm-hmm.

for sure, yeah. And I think that one of the things that’s really important in that journey is being mindful of the fact that it takes time. know, so many people I run into want, I want spirit communication now. I want to hear just like whatever, you know? And like, kind of…

Althaea (06:35)
Yes, yes, yes.

What’s a spell that really works

now?

Andrew McGregor (06:46)
Right? And know, and I

mean, that’s fair. I run a store, we sell in all that kind of stuff, and there are ways in which people can access magic that isn’t what we’re talking about. But when we’re having this conversation, we’re not talking about something that you just pick up and put on and off you go. We’re talking about spending time, building a connection, opening to what happens.

Althaea (07:07)
Yeah.

Andrew McGregor (07:14)
allowing a change that comes from the magic in the practice and the engagement in the world and it sets you up to grow into what you are hoping to become and what you will be, right?

Althaea (07:28)
Yeah, absolutely. Especially like you were saying, the connections, the relationships are such a big deal because you rewriting your life. You’re opening yourself up to relationships with spirits that when you’re first starting out, you have no idea are even there. And they’re…

They are there. They’re there right now around you, you know? Even if you’re just at home in your bedroom, there are spirits there with you. And they’re not spirits that you have to be afraid of, that you should be like, you know, running for the incense to cleanse out of your room or anything like that. They’re just people that you share space with the same way that you have spiders in your house, you know, the same way that there are squirrels in your backyard. There’s just other types of people, other beings that exist around you and share that space with you. And you can have relationships

Andrew McGregor (08:02)
Mm-hmm.

Althaea (08:16)
And it’s not gonna look like not all relationships are like, my God, we’re best friends. Can I borrow a cup of sugar? It’s not like that, you know, like you have a relationship already with anyone else, even if you don’t know that they exist. Your life, your actions impacts them in some way. And it’s the same way with the spirits that are around you that are in your home that are share the land that you live upon. Your actions impact them. And the big thing then with witchcraft and approaching it this way is that you begin to recognize that you can

feel

and see that impact. And that’s really cool, actually. It really shows you you’re not alone. You actually truly are in this web of connection with other beings, other humans, other animals, other spirit people. It’s just this huge thing. And we’re never actually really alone. It’s really great.

Andrew McGregor (09:07)
Yeah. And

I think that, you know, it’s also really helpful when you’re getting started to remember that this is everywhere. When we say it’s everywhere, we mean it’s everywhere. I live in downtown Toronto, you know, surrounded by millions of people, and I have many, many connections to varying beings in the neighbourhood.

Althaea (09:16)
you

Andrew McGregor (09:33)
where I live, you know, and near the store and other places. And then I have those places that are maybe more remote or more natural that people might think of as more spiritually, inherently spiritual, you know. But the fact of the matter is that, you know, there’s this great horse chestnut tree in the park not far from me. you know, I’ve lived where I live for like…

15 years now and every year go by I collect a couple I leave a little something you know sometimes when I’m walking by with a dog or whatever I’m like hey how’s it going today you know like literally just say something and kind of like sit there and have a feel and then two years ago maybe I was I was going by and uh you know I just sat there and felt this whole sort of different thing and heard some communication

Althaea (10:18)
Yeah.

Andrew McGregor (10:32)
around stuff that I could do and I was like, thank you and I left a little offering and as soon as I left the offering, the wind kicked up and all these chestnuts fell out of the tree, just so many, right? And I’m like, look at that, look at that, right? This is a conversation that’s been 10, 12 years in the making, right? Even for somebody who has a lot of experience speaking with spirits, this kind of work follows its own time.

Althaea (10:43)
nice.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Yeah, absolutely. And you bring up so many good points there. Like just one that you can be an animist in a city. Cities are absolutely filled with spirits and those spirits are not all just dead humans who are still hanging out. There’s so many other types. know, a city doesn’t replace the land. And it also we have so many stories within folklore of spirits that specifically exist within human made structures. You know, we have spirits that live in houses behind stoves. We spirits that live in barns.

There’s so many things like that, you know. We’re not so special that our creations can somehow be devoid of spirits. Like, it’s not happening, you know?

Andrew McGregor (11:42)
for sure.

Yeah. So I guess this kind of leads me a little bit to another question that I have for you. So what we’re talking about here so far is this sort of direct experience, right? This personal question or engagement and relationship building with trees, plants, spirits, animals, the lands, what have you. What about deities? Where does that come in for you?

Althaea (11:55)
Yeah.

I know this part kind of seems sometimes like not a contradiction but sort of a compartmentalization when I talk to some people but as much as the animism is like deeply a part of who I am so is polytheism and especially with my work with the community.

I am dedicated to a few deities. Everything I do is part of the work that I do for them. I teach because they tell me to teach. I write books begrudgingly because they tell me to write books. So my work as a spirit worker is for them, through them.

Andrew McGregor (12:44)
Yep.

Althaea (12:54)
I don’t know, it’s kind of everything. It’s just another form of relationships with spirits because gods absolutely are a part of that spectrum of beings that includes spirits.

I don’t know, to me personally, it’s a natural expansion of the relationships that I have with one of my familiars or spirits in my house or the spirits that live in my backyard. It’s just another component of that, just another type of being with a different type of relationship, kind of different little dynamics there. Kind of little, yeah. Huge, actually, different dynamics there. yeah, for me, it’s a natural.

Andrew McGregor (13:34)
Listen.

Althaea (13:37)
expansion on that. I can definitely see why and how for some people it would be an area they wouldn’t want to go into and that’s that’s totally fine. It’s not a requirement to have relationships with God’s impracticing anonism, but it does tend to also go hand in hand with it so it’s not unusual either.

Andrew McGregor (13:58)
Yeah,

so I definitely, I’m very public because I’m in the store and people are coming in with their stories all the time. if folks feel drawn to a deity, what do you recommend? Because when we’re talking about this sort of animism, we’re talking about the possibility of direct communication, getting to know them over time.

Chillin’ in the park under your favourite tree, whatever that might be, right? But when we’re talking about deities, there’s so much sort of different possibilities, right? There’s, for the most part, a ton of literature about them. There’s varying practices, whether they’re a living practice or not a living practice anymore, you know, and so on. Where do you encourage people to sort of begin if they feel called to work with somebody?

Althaea (14:29)
Yes.

Mm-hmm.

I love how timely this is because I’m actually starting one of my favorite courses that I teach is actually starting up again in about a week. And this is like our whole entire focus and we’re going to be diving into that. And it’s really easy to get hung up on the research and trying to find every last little bit of information and just the one perfect piece of information so you feel confident enough to do something.

Andrew McGregor (15:05)
Nice. Very cool.

Althaea (15:21)
But you’re never gonna find that. You’re never gonna find enough information. You’re never gonna have that one little piece that makes it all make sense. In so many cases, like you said, we’re working with gods that no longer have active traditions. We’re working with broken lore and mythology. So.

You have to fill in the pieces and the way that you fill in those pieces is by directly engaging with the gods and getting their input. And they will tell you, they will absolutely tell you. They will teach you purification ways to better engage with them. They will teach you full on rituals. They will tell you what kind of offerings they like. But you build up to that. When you’re just getting started, the big thing is to just…

actually get started. know, you don’t need a lot of tools or anything. Just light a candle, put a bowl of water before you, just calm yourself, know, ground, center, hold yourself open and say hi.

And then just wait and see what happens. Make a nice little offering. It doesn’t have to be complicated either. It doesn’t have to be incense. It doesn’t have to be wine. It can be. But you can give just clean water. As long as it’s sincere and there’s that part of you giving your heart with the offering. That’s really all that matters. And you might have some sort of sense that that God is there. You might not.

a lot of that though it’s not

If you don’t, don’t take it personally. A lot of it is dependent upon skills. When you don’t have those skills developed to, for example, feel, sense, or move energy, you’re less likely to actually feel the presence of any type of spirit, including gods. And that’s okay. That’s part of why it takes time. You know, it gives you something else to focus on, but you can still make that effort and reach out and just see what happens. And maybe something will, maybe something won’t. You can always reach out again later.

You definitely should.

Andrew McGregor (17:22)
Yeah,

and I think it’s interesting to make sure that we listen to ourselves in that process. Where I started out working as a reader, the folks who ran the space were super duper into Hakate. And for me at that time I was sort of…

Althaea (17:41)
you

Andrew McGregor (17:45)
you know, towards being initiated to shangho and the Orisha traditions and coming out of doing a lot of solar-based ceremonial magic. everyone who was around that space was like, yeah, you gotta work with Akate, you gotta do this, you gotta do that. She’s the best and you know, don’t get me wrong, she’s great, right? But…

Althaea (18:02)
You

Andrew McGregor (18:09)
But I really had this feeling, like, I’m like, that’s just not for me. That is not, this is not my thing, you know? And about four or five months into being there, I had a dream where I met her. And she showed up and was terrifying. And she looked at me, and she kind of looked me up and down, and she said, you’re not one of mine, but you’re okay. And that was the end of the dream.

And I was like, perfect, thank you for the confirmation. Glad I get to keep my job, because I had little doubt that if she had said no, I would have been out of there pretty fast, right? So I mean, I think that it’s interesting that we can run into beings in different contexts, and that doesn’t necessarily mean that these deities are ours, or are for us in the world, right? Like I’ve met many beings along the way. And…

Althaea (18:38)
I love that.

Mm.

Andrew McGregor (19:03)
You know, they’re not, they didn’t give me their personal cell phone number, you know. I have someone, I definitely have their personal cell phone number. I can get a hold of them anytime now. But yeah, I think that there’s a real difference around how it is to sort of walk through the world and engage in that way.

Althaea (19:07)
You

Yeah.

And that’s interesting to think about too, is that even if

like Hikari says that, no, you’re not mine. That doesn’t mean that you can’t still come to her and talk to her too. Like we don’t have to be called and claimed by a deity. We can just have casual relationships. You know, you can have just temporary relationships too, and that’s okay. And if somebody that you feel called to says, you know, hey, you’re not mine. It’s okay, though. That’s not the end of the world either. There might be somebody else who is

Andrew McGregor (19:53)
Mm-hmm.

Althaea (19:56)
you know, a better fit for you might just be somebody who’s a better fit for you at that time too because we are fluid changing creatures too. We don’t stay the same hopefully. You know, hopefully we continue to grow and change and so certain deities may be better fits for us at different times.

And there’s a huger conversation there too about how if you’re in a committed relationship with a god it kind of makes you not fit for other deities too so that kind of changes who gets to be around you and who you’re around and who you’re allowed to do things for too. That’s a way way bigger discussion.

Andrew McGregor (20:24)
I’m upset.

Yep. That is a bigger discussion.

That falls into the category of we don’t get to know the full scope of what we’re getting into sometimes, and we only find those things as we further get down the road, right? You know? Yeah.

Althaea (20:40)
Honestly, yeah, you think you make

one promise and that promise ends up being 10 other things.

Andrew McGregor (20:49)
Exactly, right, exactly.

Yeah. I guess one of the questions that I wanted to maybe address a bit too, because we’ve talked a little bit about it takes time to learn to heal here, we gotta take our time to build that connection and so on. Do you have thoughts or feelings sort of around the idea of…

What if people feel like they’re imitating stuff? What if they’re concerned about appropriating traditions? You know, some of these things. Because I think this is an important conversation to touch on, even though it’s a very deep and nuanced conversation beyond the full scope we’re going to get into here. But, you know, where do you think about that stuff?

Althaea (21:29)
Yeah.

And there really is a lot of nuance here. I mean, it is hugely important conversation, especially if you look at the history of the contemporary pagan movement, there is.

There is a lot of appropriation. There is a lot of flat out theft and entitlement of marginalized cultures and marginalized religions. And it is something that we are still reckoning with right now. And it’s really great to see that there are more people talking about it. It’s really grown in the last five years, especially the conversation around that.

I do feel like at least looking online that some people do get so concerned with not appropriating that they’re not doing anything. You know, they just kind of hold back and don’t take any sort of first steps in any direction. And it makes sense, but there are practices that are

Andrew McGregor (22:37)
Mm-hmm.

Althaea (22:47)
not necessarily universal, but incredibly common to the human experience of having relationships with otherworldly beings other than human people. And we see a lot of those ways. I’m trying to think how to word this without like setting myself up for being grossly misinterpreted. They’re. my God, I know. Right.

Andrew McGregor (22:59)
Mm-hmm.

Well, it’s going to be on the internet, inherently we will be misinterpreting some of that at the top. Maybe most at the top, but…

Althaea (23:18)
We know that there are purification methods that are very commonplace, exist within huge variations of cultures and practices. We know that there are ways of giving offerings. Yeah. Exactly. We…

Andrew McGregor (23:27)
Exactly. Spiritual baths are a very common thing all over the planet. Yes.

Althaea (23:35)
We know that certain practices have greater interest and discussion around them, especially online. And that comes down to…

individual people with their backgrounds and them communicating and sharing and it has to do with trends. It doesn’t necessarily mean that something that we come across is only found within that person specific tradition or background. You know, it’s really helpful to look at the whole bigger picture and recognize that, you know, like, like you mentioned, Hikati being very big with this group, like she really has her her moments.

her trends really rise, especially online. There was a thing with Artemis too, like back in the late 90s and early, that’s where Artemis was everybody’s girl. And then it was Hikari again, and then the Morgan had a thing. So the trends really influenced to what practices are being discussed and they can falsely create a context.

that we may believe that that practice exists within, not recognizing that it actually is bigger and does exist in other forms. Like smoke cleansing comes up a lot, especially when people are talking about smudging, not being open to everybody.

you know, setting shit on fire is very, very commonplace in the human experience. Like, we really like to burn things and it’s fun and it makes a good component in witchcraft. You can do a lot just by setting shit on fire. I’m a big fan.

Andrew McGregor (25:15)
Yeah, mm-hmm, me

too. And you can also make a choice to be like, you know what? I’m gonna burn something that’s more aligned with who I’m working with, you know, or whatever, right? Like I think that that’s part of the competition too, right? We have so many folks who wanna steer towards, you know, it has to be frankincense or it has to be white sage or it has to be this or it has to be that. And I think that, you know,

Althaea (25:28)
exactly.

you

Mm.

Andrew McGregor (25:44)
It doesn’t have to be any of those things, you know, and I know certainly in my ceremonial magic days I was like, well, you know, this is maybe sort of more on point even. It’s like, well, if I’m working with this specific angel and they like this specific…

frankincense and history tells us it’s actually from this region and I can get that maybe I should do that one instead of all the more generic things or maybe not right you know we can we can really shape that up you know yeah

Althaea (26:14)
Yeah.

that’s

a really good point.

I was in a conversation with some of my students recently and someone had asked me what my my favorite herbs were to burn for purification and I made a joke about being an insufferable hipster witch because all of the herbs that I use, they’re all herbs that I got myself, you know, and then I was in relationship with those specific plants and those specific plants have a connection to like some of the deities that I’m dedicated to. So the reason that they worked was because of

my relationships for me. They’re not herbs that were necessarily on anybody’s like personal correspondence list for purificatory herbs, but for me, because of my relationships, because of the friendships with those trees, they work really well. They work very, well.

Andrew McGregor (26:56)
Exactly.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

did a 2000, I did a 10-day fast and ritual cycle in the woods by myself. Didn’t talk to anybody else, didn’t see another human being for the whole time. Brought enough fruit to sort of see me through the first part of the fast and then just drank water for the rest. And there was this cherry tree in the west of where I was staying.

Althaea (27:17)
Peace.

Andrew McGregor (27:33)
and the sun, when it’s set behind it, illuminated all the resin. Like these beautiful, know, cherry reds, stained glass little things. I still have some of that resin. And every now and then when I need to connect with the aspirations of that practice and what I was doing at that time.

Althaea (27:45)
That cool.

Andrew McGregor (27:57)
I’ll take a little bit of that and just burn it. And it just opens me back to that connection of that time and place. And that is, we can get super specific, right? It doesn’t have to be every cherry tree. It might be every cherry tree, right? Or it might be a particular thing in a particular place. In fact, that place is now a subdivision. It’s like, whatever, time moves on, right? But yeah.

Althaea (28:04)
Yeah.

you

Hmm.

Yeah, exactly. Make it really personal like that.

Andrew McGregor (28:27)
Yeah,

I think I have a couple thoughts on sort of the bigger appropriation or engagement kind of conversation. I think there are two things that folks should ask themselves if they’re engaging in these practices and it takes them in certain directions. And one is, I think that if we’re doing land-based work,

you know, here in North America and in many places, I think that it behooves us to consider what our relationship is to the Indigenous folks of this place. And I think that can look a wide range for a lot of different people, but I think it’s really important to sort of acknowledge the deep history of the place and the people who’ve been here in those things. And that could look a wide range of people.

I don’t necessarily have a specific thing that I think everybody should get to around that, but I think it’s a question that we should sit with, you know, and sit with regularly. So that’s one thought that I have. And the other thought that I have is if there is a living tradition which you’re feeling moved towards a spirit from, at some point…

Althaea (29:36)
Absolutely.

Andrew McGregor (29:53)
you should ask yourself the question of why would I go and engage that living tradition or why might I choose not to engage that living tradition? Because I think that there are a lot of things that…

we can, you know, there are a lot of questions and stuff that could be sorted out very swiftly. For example, know, I’m a priest of Shango in an Afro-Cuban lineage, have been for 16 years and practicing this tradition for 25 now. And

People waffle with all these questions. Well, what is it that this Arisha wants from me? Am I meant to walk this path? Is this something that I should be doing? And when it comes to living traditions, they usually have a mechanism for answering that. And if that’s a thing that you’re looking for, sit with that question about it. And most of the…

I know lot of people of various traditions like these and they’re generally very welcoming and generally very open to seeing what’s up with people. consider that as a possibility too, which of course takes us away from the witchcraft in which we’re talking about it. But I think there is a way in which people don’t always know that you can get what is essentially a definitive answer inside of a lot of living traditions.

you know, if you can find them and connect with those people.

Althaea (31:25)
Yeah, and that’s really that’s worth pointing out too that those living traditions

Yes, we see them as being a tradition and a practice of the people, but it stems forth from the gods. That is how those gods are dictating that they are to be approached and how they are to be honored. So it really does make sense that if our gods are real, and they are, and these really are their ways, that there would be ways to double check, to get confirmations, to test things, to get answers, to more formally communicate with the gods and then

share that information. if you really are feeling called to those traditions, to those gods, and yet the response that you get, like maybe you have a spirit worker do a reading for you and they’re like, actually, you know, and then you go to another spirit worker there and also kind of confirm that they’re like, actually, not so much, dude.

Andrew McGregor (32:02)
you

Althaea (32:21)
You gotta respect that because at some point, you know, if you keep getting answers that this guy is saying no, even though you feel called to them, you gotta look into that. Like, what is that? Is there something more? Are you misunderstanding your own emotions? Is this some sort of a bias that’s coming out in a really weird way? Well, not weird, but like unexpected way.

Andrew McGregor (32:31)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, right, what’s the

psychological baggage that’s playing out there, right? Like, you know, I mean, we can go many ways with that. I think it’s really super important to acknowledge that, you know? Yeah. Maybe you could take a moment and say what you mean by spirit worker. Because, you know, I spend a ton of time with…

Althaea (32:46)
Exactly. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

You

Andrew McGregor (33:06)
folks from Caribbean and South America and other places who use that term in a particular way. And I hear it sort of tossed around more casually in other settings. So I’d love to hear what you say to that topic. I know, put you on the hot seat,

Althaea (33:15)
Yeah. gosh.

Basically, spear worker is a religious specialist who has expertise in communicating with the gods and other spirits and performs that role and function for the community.

it can look like a lot of things. For me, it looks like sitting on the floor throwing bones, whispering over burning herbs, all hastily jotting down notes that I’ll type up later for clients.

Scrawling in frustration at candles, pouring out little cups of wine. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of conversation, getting instructions, conveying instructions.

Andrew McGregor (33:57)
Yeah, doing the practice, engaging with the folks. Yeah, yeah.

And I guess if folks are looking for someone to connect with a spirit worker, do you have any advice on how they might sort of choose somebody who could sort of speak to this for them, you know?

Althaea (34:29)
It’s kind of hard right now, know, with ongoing current events. Yeah, a lot of us have kind of pulled back from public view. Like the people that I used to go to are not available online anymore at all. I know.

Andrew McGregor (34:32)
I do know that’s why I’m-

Althaea (34:47)
My own services are kind of sporadically open at this point. Like I just open to new clients, but I have more people interested than I can actually functionally serve. There’s not enough of us, especially that are available outside of like very specific traditions too.

And I mean, your best bet is always going to be looking online, of course. It’s the way that we find anything these days. You got to do a hell of a lot of vetting, though. There are a lot of people who are not a lot of people, but there are some people now who are calling themselves spirit workers. And they’re not, you know, people. see a word and you’re like, wow, that’s that’s a nice word. And then you kind of adopt it, but you don’t know what it holds and what it means to other people in other communities. So there are people that call themselves spirit workers and.

And they’re not, you know, they don’t have that specialization. They’re not operating within a religious structure. They’re not, you know, functionally performing that specific job to the community. So you really, really got to vet people. You really got to vet people. There’s so many people who are scammers and grifters, but there’s also just a lot of people who are misrepresenting themselves out of hope, out of trying to be the thing they want to be and just not realize

Andrew McGregor (35:52)
Yeah.

Althaea (36:07)
what the standard is actually and that makes sense.

Andrew McGregor (36:08)
Yeah, they don’t even know what they don’t even

know, right? Yeah.

Althaea (36:12)
Exactly, exactly.

And with like the ongoing pandemic, we had a huge explosion of people turning pro with astrology, with terror, with everything and anything during lockdown as a way of like basically feeding themselves, feeding their families, you know, paying the bills. And it really makes sense. And I totally get it. You know, I started this work out of necessity to way back. But it really changed things, especially with social media and the way that SEO practices

for

social media and marketing take things to such a superficial level, little sound bites, know? So the standards for just what passes as a professional are lower. The standards for what passes as for just a general practitioner are lower. Everything’s just kind of being reduced to more comfortable, palatable, and easily conveyed forms. it’s…

it’s not necessarily to our benefit and it certainly makes the searching harder.

Andrew McGregor (37:14)
Yeah, and I would say, you know, the two things, I love everything that you just said, right? And I would sort of add to that. Number one, take a look at how they are, you know? I mean, people show you who they are, and if you watch and see what’s going on, you’ll see how they are. And not saying that everybody needs to be gregarious and smiley and super friendly.

necessarily like that’s not exactly it either. But look at how people are because they will show you right and if you see them turning their back on people a lot having issues with a lot of people you know all that kind of stuff. So ask yourself why is that you know it’s a in my experience it’s never because that person knows the one true way it’s because that person’s got some issues right and number two I would say

Althaea (38:05)
You

Andrew McGregor (38:12)
It’s normal to have anxiety. It’s normal to be stressed about things in the world. It’s so normal to come to somebody for a reading because you are stressed and anxious. Like honestly, people don’t come for readings most of the time in good times. But if the person you’re speaking with encourages that anxiety, says you should be afraid, you know, this, that, whatever, you know, I spent…

Althaea (38:22)
Yes.

No.

Andrew McGregor (38:39)
really up until this end of last year where I closed my magical practice for hire, function as a spirit worker for folks. And out of all that time, all those folks coming to me to undo things and deal with big problems and whatever, I only ever saw one person where I was like, you should be afraid. You should be very, very afraid. And quite literally, the person came into the reading room

and I’ve only ever seen this once, physical objects just started moving and falling on the floor and smashing. And I was just like, ooh, oh boy. And I saw it when I walked into the store, I looked at them, I’m like, I sure hope I don’t have to read for those people, don’t like what’s going on with them at all. And I read for them a little bit, and basically they were involved in some really bad stuff, and somebody else who was even worse than they were had wanted their

Althaea (39:24)
you

Andrew McGregor (39:38)
territory I guess, right? And it was so intense and I was like, look, here’s the deal, here’s your solution. And even for them, there was a solution. And I also said at the end, I’m like, don’t ever come back, I never wanna see you again. I don’t want anything to do with anything you’re involved in. But in general, right, you don’t need to be afraid. There’s a cleansing, there’s a thing, there’s an appeasement, there’s a resolution.

Althaea (39:54)
Right? This shit rubs off.

Yeah.

Andrew McGregor (40:05)
So if people are making you afraid, pressuring you, you gotta do this, you gotta just be like, oh, I don’t think so. I’m actually gonna do a whole episode sometime this year on how not to get scammed. yeah. yeah. So I guess the last thing I wanna kind of wrap up, we sort of drifted into this territory anyway a little bit. Right? What should people be cautious about?

Althaea (40:17)
nice, yeah. Definitely need more resources on that.

I love a good tangent.

Andrew McGregor (40:34)
What are practices that won’t serve them or aren’t helpful or something to kind of watch for as you’re going into this so that you don’t kind of maybe get in your own way or something like that.

Althaea (40:53)
And wrap it up with a big huge question.

Andrew McGregor (40:57)
I can lead with my one if you’d like. So my big caution for folks is don’t jump the gun. Say something happens, say to yourself, okay, we’ll see. And then it happens again, you say, okay, well, let’s see, right? Because sometimes we have these big dramatic experiences.

Althaea (40:59)
Alright, alright.

Andrew McGregor (41:28)
And it’s nothing, right? It’s our mind, it’s that spicy burrito we ate before bedtime, it’s, you know, whatever, right? Something can stir stuff up. And it’s not that there’s not something there, but often it can be very psychologically driven. But if things are communication from spirit, they’re going to pan out over time. And you’re going to see…

Althaea (41:47)
Yeah.

Andrew McGregor (41:54)
two, three, four, five times down the road, every time you’re at this tree, every time this thing happens, you’re gonna have an experience. You’re gonna have the same or a similar experience. And to me, that’s the stuff to pursue, to get excited about, and to sort of pursue your practice around, because that’s where something’s leaning back. And you might…

Clarify what that is over time. It may not be exactly as you understood it the first time that’s all part of it, but to me that’s one of the strongest pathways in and one of the biggest pitfalls where people are like I had a dream and this being came to me and this like cool. All right, maybe so I don’t know right But tell me if you have three or four more and then I’m gonna get really excited about it, you know

Althaea (42:47)
Yeah, no, that definitely relates to what I was thinking too. It’s like a huge thing to watch out for. I guess the basic thing would be to remember that, yeah, it’s spiritual practice.

But you are physically incarnate and you live in the physical world and you are practicing in the physical world. Every physical or every spiritual experience that you have is made possible and includes the active participation of your physical body. And it is happening here on the physical land. We really do bring in all of these influences from our society and…

that idea of the mortification of the flesh, you know, and the prioritization of the spiritual, it really gets tangled up in that excitement of doing a new thing, you know, the excitement of practicing witchcraft. like, fuck yeah, I’m gonna talk to spirits and it’s gonna be great. And so you can kind of forget the fact that the physical world is still a part of it and your brain is absolutely part of that physical world and it is also having an effect.

Andrew McGregor (43:51)
Yeah.

Althaea (44:00)
So between like your own brain doing things like causing you to notice patterns in the world that you want to see, you know, that’s your reticular activating system. It’s literally your brain trying to entertain you or how, like when you first start meditating, you know, and everybody has these amazing visions when they first start meditating, it’s literally your brain trying to entertain you the same way that if you stare at like a tiled floor, the lines are going to start changing with the squares, you know, because your brain’s entertaining you. You know, you need to recognize that that’s here.

that’s impacting you. Just yeah don’t forget that the physical world is also really fucking amazing and influencing things.

Andrew McGregor (44:38)
Yeah.

Eat good food, get some sleep, move your body, chat and connect with people, have fun.

Althaea (44:44)
Right? Exactly.

just focusing too hard on having spiritual experiences. Being a spiritual person can cause a lot of spiritual bypassing where you’ve got this like elevated sense of ego because, yo, you’re doing these things. You’re not doing those other like worldly things of the common people. And that’s just more really icky stuff from the overculture that’s being brought into the spiritual practice and being replicated and kind of amplified. And like with amnomism, we’re really trying to dissolve

that separation between like the idea of magic and the everyday between the physical world and the spiritual world. So leaning too hard into the spirit side of things and scorning the physical side doesn’t help with dissolving that separation. It reinforces it. Yeah, just really keeping your wits about you. You know, just because it’s magic, common sense doesn’t go out the window.

There are actually rules to how this all works.

Andrew McGregor (45:49)
Yeah, I think it’s…

Yeah, I think so much of that can be a product of Christianity and its influence and sort of the division from sort of living practice of various folk practices and spiritual practices and so on that we’ve had this gap from and that people are sort of trying to return to. It’s like, you know, maybe our great-great-grandmother would just be like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, you do this and you do that. You gotta go see this person. Oh, and I’m down here, so I’m gonna, you know.

Althaea (45:58)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Andrew McGregor (46:21)
bring some berries for this tree or like things, right? Culturally specific, space specific and so on. And it was much less seen as completely separate from everything else. So, yeah.

Althaea (46:24)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Exactly. Now, though, there’s been that separation has been maintained for so long. don’t have a lot of us don’t have living examples of what it looks like to not be just so focused on the physical world and materialism on, you know, consumerism as the solution to all of our problems. So it makes sense that we would lean so far the other way, because if you’re trying to not do that, well, then what’s the solution? You do something different, but it kind of just reinforces the problem. But in a different

way.

Andrew McGregor (47:06)
Yeah, for

sure. Cool. Well, that seems like a great place to wrap up this conversation. It’s been a total delight to get to chat with you. Where are you hanging out? Where are you at? Unfortunately, this will probably drop after your course has started. But don’t worry, I’ll shout it out in places anyways so people can find it. But yeah.

Althaea (47:17)
Thank you.

Yeah.

you

Big place to find me is my website. It’s ladyAlthaea.com. L-A-D-Y-A-L-T-H-A-E-A. I’m going to emphasize that A.

Andrew McGregor (47:41)
Lincoln show notes.

Althaea (47:43)
Yeah.

Social media wise, I’m on Instagram. I’m on threads. I should probably suck it up enjoying blue sky. It’s about it these days. Yeah. I do have a community that I safeguard too. It’s called The Winding Way. God, I struggle to even describe it because we have so much going on all of the time. I’ve got a really great group.

Andrew McGregor (47:53)
It’s not bad over there. Yeah.

Well, so I’m not in it, but I mean, I guess maybe

I can offer what I think is going on there. Imagine like being on the internet, but without it being open to the public and clowns showing up and making a mess all the time and actually having access to people who are showing up genuinely and practicing and people with a bunch of experience and beginners as well. Does that kind of sound like what’s going on over there? Yeah.

Althaea (48:15)
Shenanigans.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah,

absolutely. We’ve got a really great group of people with different ranges of experience. We’ve got people who are brand new to witchcraft, brand new to relationships with the gods. We’ve got people with decades of experience who, you know, they’re just, in relationship with different gods, different spirits. We’ve got people working with gods from all different sorts of pantheons. We’re really diverse when it comes to like ethnic and racial backgrounds.

We’re predominantly queer, predominantly neurodivergent, not everybody but a lot of us. God, we have a divination swap, we do readings for each other, we’ve got the polytheist and animist support group where our big focus right now is working through religious baggage so that way we can more deeply embrace polytheism and animism as worldviews and it’s phenomenal. It’s really great, we have really great conversations and kind of like gently make ourselves feel bad when we realize that.

We’ve been holding like baggage related to the word like worship or prayer. We had such good conversations on the word prayer recently. God, you really don’t know even how deep the baggage goes until you start peeling back the layers. And it’s so great to be doing that work with people who are committed to it and actually genuinely supportive of each other. There’s so much trust and vulnerability. I love it. It’s really great.

Andrew McGregor (49:44)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, and you know, I think, you

know, having access to other people around that stuff is so helpful. You know, so I remember back in my Phthalemic days that I was doing Libre Resh, which is a relatively short ceremony where you connect with the sun at the four corners of the day, right? And I was like, you know, despite being deep in ceremonial magic, I was like, I’m not religious.

Althaea (50:07)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Andrew McGregor (50:30)
praying about doing this. This is spiritual practice based on energy and conversation with beings. And one day there, know, I finally achieved a perfect month of every day during the four salutations, because it’s really hard to maintain that amongst the life, right? And my friend says, great, you know, and he goes,

By the way, Andrew, I have a question for you. I’m like, uh-huh. goes, so what about that is not praying? And I was like, and I swear, I opened and closed my mouth about 10 times, and then I think I said, hate you, and then I went away and spent two weeks just thinking about it being like, damn, okay, I guess I’m on the other side of something different here now, you know? And it’s so hard to see ourselves, right? So yeah, for sure.

Althaea (51:15)
That’s great.

It

is, right? You’re like, I’m not religious, I don’t pray. And then you like make a list of the things that you actually do as part of your spiritual practice and yeah, it’s all right there showing you the truth.

Andrew McGregor (51:26)
Right? Yeah. Yeah.

Well thank you so much for making the time to chat with me today. It’s been everything that I hoped it would be and folks who definitely follow Althaea on the interwebs and if it’s your jam go check out what she’s up to. Yeah there’s a lot of great stuff going on there.

Althaea (51:36)
Yeah, thank you.