Do you know how to be a witch?
Symbols and archetypes appearing in our dreams or fairy tales, stories, myths, legends, paintings, or poetry are designed to direct our attention to the spiritual part of our life. One such archetype specifically associated with this target is the archetype of the one who knows, the wise woman, a witch.
In this article you will learn:
- What the witch archetype is.
- How the transformation from woman to witch is going.
- What dangers await modern witches.
Archetypes of a witch (also known as a wild woman, a wise woman, an old woman, Baba Yaga, a shaman, or a healer), i.e. a woman with knowledge, often related to herbal medicine, medicine, and nature (nature). A woman with the inner wisdom that comes directly from her direct contact with the source of all that is.
This archetype was well described in the book “Women Who Run with the Wolves” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, a certified psychoanalyst of the Jungian school, researcher of legends, and poet. She analyzed the archetype of a wild woman in the most famous fairy tales, such as “Bluebeard”, “The Ugly Duckling”, “The Little Match Girl” and many others.
The witch embodies a woman liberated from all domination and all limitations.
It is the only female archetype with the power of its own accord. It does not allow anyone else to define it. A wife, a sister, a virgin mother, or even a whore are archetypes built on relationships with others, on the ego, because it still wants to belong to someone. A witch, on the other hand, is a woman who supports herself on her own and without the help of others. But to do this, she has to get to know herself.
Knowing oneself is not selfishness to focus on oneself, but a royal road to others.
You start your way to yourself as a naive woman. The pre-Slavic word “nevesta” originally meant “the one that no one knows”. This name was used to describe a young woman who entered the family. The “one that no one knows about” is also “the one who knows nothing about herself”, the one who will know each other well only when she becomes a member of the family of all existence.
Each of us begins life as one who does not know ourselves. We don’t know why we’re here and what our role in the world is. As time passes, however, we slowly begin to discover ourselves. If we only open ourselves to our inner truth, we will discover the wise woman in ourselves. The one who knows. Clarissa Pinkola traces the process of transforming a woman into a witch in her book.
And so you can learn from it that in order to find enlightenment, you must first plunge into darkness. First, you have to face your loneliness and hunger for your soul.
Each of us has a creative potential that remains dormant in the initial phase of our lives.
As we enter adulthood, we are naive and uninitiated. In addition, there is a force inside and outside us that makes it difficult for us to reach our inner truth. And these are our inner beliefs, resulting from our life experiences, and these are beliefs and expectations imposed on us by society through upbringing, religion, and education. At every step and in every stage of our life, we get into very confusing situations to work off our karma.
We let ourselves be deceived by the illusion of life, entertainment, pleasure, the promise of high status, security, eternal love, exciting adventures, and sex. At this stage, it is very easy to get carried away by our ego. First, we build our identity, and our ego, through relationships, starting a family, career, and lots of other things. Only to realize at the next stage of life that we are missing something in all this, that we have lost ourselves along the way and in this whole race. The real self. This is the so-called lost soul.
To discover our inner strength, we need initiation, initiation into the secrets of our own potential.
This initiation causes consciousness to sprout within us. We begin to confront our own inner devastation in order to destroy our own self-destruction and inner deadness. We must be hungry for the soul. Penetrate our insight. And then overcome that aspect of your psyche that caused you to lose your passion for life. When we do this, the male part of the energy of our soul will be revealed, i.e. the bridge that connects the soul with the outside world. Then we have to fight our inner saboteur, who prevents us from thinking about our spiritual life that arouses internal conflict. This stage of development can be found, for example, in the myth about Bluebeard.
Initiation consists of letting “what must die”, as Clarissa writes. Then it comes to the so-called death of the ego and the birth of intuition. Often along with the activation of other psychic senses.
The next stage is shadow lighting, i.e. direct experience of the negative qualities of your personality (jealousy, possessiveness, abuse, greed, selfishness, etc.). The next one is to dare to experience intuition, and learn to develop sensitivity to the mystery of the unconscious. At first, contact with your own intuition may be very weak, but if properly trained, it will show itself in all its glory. Learn to confront your own strength, your weirdness, wildness, and otherness. The other side of your nature. Meeting your own spirituality and not escaping from it.
This stage is followed by the recognition of the strength and power of inner cleansing, discernment, nourishing your spirituality, and building energy, and thoughts.
It involves renewing your values and ideals, keeping your mind clear, igniting your passions, finding new ways, and engaging in your own work and creativity. And also cleansing your thoughts, throwing trivial things out of the psyche, and separating thoughts from emotions. Rejection of what does not serve you. Observing the forces of the unconscious and their actions, even when the ego is not aware of it. Searching for knowledge about the nature of the world.
Consent to life and consent to death. Allowing your consciousness to evolve naturally. Respecting its pace. Not rushing it. Awareness and acceptance that understanding will come by itself. Drawing on the knowledge of ancestors, reaching to your roots, and accepting your own difference. Learning to accurately recognize the negative shadow of your own psyche and the negative aspects of others.
The next step is to make an effort to do something with your knowledge that will bring good.
Even though knowing about the nature of the world can weigh you down, you may feel the need to give it up and go back to your previous life. The next step is to recognize duality. Integrating the male and female energy of your soul (anima and animus). Integration of soul and ego. It is a difficult process because at every step you are faced with elements that are opposed to consciousness, which make us fascinated by what is shrouded in darkness, as well as your inner saboteur and succumbing to the desires of the ego.
The next phase is discovering true unconditional love.
Each of us dreams of perfect love from early adolescence, but to find it, we must first love our own ugliness. We cannot run away from it, although that is what we do in the beginning. We have to touch on what is repulsive about us. If we overcome ourselves, we’ll get a reward. So we delve into ourselves and gain a new perspective on ourselves. We need integrity. Only then will we be able to love. We patiently learn deep love. Love ourselves. Through this stage, we learn the mutual relations of all aspects of the creator and our participation in them. We learn to love others by loving ourselves.
Our heart directs our attention to our inner wounded child, who stores our painful memories, negative attitudes, and disturbing emotional patterns that have their origins in childhood and adolescence. Until we stop thinking like a wounded child, our love will be conditioned and accompanied by the fear of losing it. Loving yourself is about confronting and loving your inner child.
Heal wounds and injuries often with the help of a healer.
Recognizing the nature of things and healing them. We have to take the risk that the beliefs instilled in us by our culture are false and that the soul is right.
Whatever happens, it will be transformed. We have to accept our wounds. We often experience the so-called “Dark Night of the soul.” The resurrection of divinity, however, gives us the courage to follow the call, even if we have no idea where to go in what direction or how long to return home. Seeking a wise quiet healing power (going to a healer), accepting the challenge of delving into the unknown psychic territory, recognizing your own illusions, calming obscene thoughts and feelings. Nobody can escape their past. We can remove it, but it will always be there. Or we can get peace of mind instead of anger by healing it.
We will not find love in another person but in ourselves. The other person can only be medicine, emotion, and fulfillment. Yet we all make the mistake of looking for love where we cannot find it.
Only through affection and compassion for ourselves, we do transfer into life from the heart level. This is when our thoughts begin to flow from the heart. Love is a succession of death and rebirth. The pain passes and a new one appears. We come out of one phase of one aspect of love to enter the next.
The way of the heart is the way of creation.
Women in particular have enormous creative power that gives them powerful impulses to act. So when we heal our inner wounds, we will become ourselves again. When we are ourselves, the beauty of our soul shines. We begin to accept our own individuality, and unique identity, but also the beauty and shape of our soul.
The next stage is forgiveness, that is, abandonment, absolution, forgetting sins, and forgiving those who caused these wounds in us. Getting rid of negative emotions. You have to tell yourself the truth about the wound and only then will you have a real idea of the right medicine.
Only then will we become the one who knows. The one who is no stranger to herself. Not all of us are ready to take this path.
Modern civilization cut off from nature cannot stand transformations.
Just as it hates witches, or women of great format because they open up to another world and give a taste of adventure and freedom. She has the power and knowledge that the official authorities despise, and also shows the way. And although they are no longer officially called witches, they do not accuse them of having sex with the devil, do not hunt for them, and do not burn them at the stake, as in the past, they still try to overpower and neutralize them.
A modern witch.
And this is through attacks on all manifestations of women’s independence, including statutory decisions on their bodies and choices. And this is by creating a pattern of self-sacrifice for men and children and the pattern of the “old maid with a cat”. Giving up one’s need for self-realization and creation for the benefit of the family. Mocking, making complexes, rejecting, and embarrassing those who choose to live their lives on their own.
Throwing into the modes of aggression, competition, and race instead of cooperation and compassion. By humiliating unequal remuneration for their contribution to the development of society. Convincing the penis complex. By perpetuating the negative model of female old age, stigmatizing menopause, or glorifying eternal youth with the entire system of cosmetic, beautifying, and aesthetic treatments. Disciplinarily threw on the pavement as soon as she exceeds the statutory retirement age.
Accusing madness, and hysteria, creating the concept of PMS and hormonal swings.
Trying to tame its natural cyclicality with hormonal piles and cut off from feeling the nature and needs of her body. Putting science on a pedestal. An arrogant science that feeds on contempt for all femininity combined with what is irrational, sentimental, hysteric, and natural that requires subjugation. A science that has long been used not to discover the world, but to maximize the profit of investors.
Glorifying reason and dressing spirituality within the framework of religion. Awful sin, impurity, hell, or virus. Mocking intuition, clairvoyance, and empathy. Accusing those who exercise their psychic senses of schizophrenia. Relegating esotericism to the margins of life. By stuffing astrology and tarot wisdom into the horoscope categories on the last page of gossip magazines.
Through sexualization, sexism, and objectification.
Brainwashing with information from gossip portals and magazines, serials, and romantic comedies. By replacing nature therapy and healthy eating with antibiotics and vaccines. Herbal medicine as a medicine. Jamming the body’s signals with painkillers and the cries of the soul with antidepressants. The conviction that the body’s natural ability to regenerate itself and heal itself requires artificial support, with the help of artificially created substances, that the immune system is insufficient and deficient. Unable to cope with the challenges of an ever-changing world.
Pushing into the role of a constant consumer and fashionista.
Stripping individuality and standardizing every aspect of her life, including her physicality. Treating a woman only as a reproducer and depriving her of her creative potential and the possibility of expressing it. Locking cities in the concrete walls, devoid of contact with nature, air, and sun. Limiting her freedom, in the name of her good.
Thus, today’s burning of witches at the stake has taken on a much more refined, veiled, and subtle form, but unfortunately, it still continues. It’s time to finally wake up from this nightmare. Listen to your inner wisdom, not to what everyone around you is telling you! Make decisions by listening to your intuition, not what they are trumpeting about on TV or censored websites. Real knowledge is not outside of you. Don’t look at others, dare to follow your own heart, and don’t be intimidated. You know what to do. You are the witch. That’s you who have the inner healing power within. You don’t need to get it from outside. Don’t be told otherwise.
Yes, it is women’s hell. Yes, it is a war, a war for the human soul!
Sit on the side for a moment, meditate, and see the world from a witness standpoint. Be Eckhart Tolle for a while. Do not be fooled by the mammalian brain, let go of emotions, abandon social programs, and your usual thought patterns, break the shackles of conformism, rise above your inner pain and fear, and feel inner peace. What do you see? What do you feel? Who you are? Let yourself discover this inner pearl, the eternal wisdom, and the essence of femininity. Be brave, be yourself. Be a witch. Wake up!
Do you feel the divinity and the power of creation in you? Don’t hesitate to use it!
This is what I write as a financial analyst, an economist specializing in International Economic Relations and Global Issues, and a former employee of the world’s largest pharmaceutical company. Witch, healer, and creator.
We let this hell happen, it’s time to stop it while it is still possible!
Some dream symbols related to the witch archetype:
- door – a symbol of a mental barrier,
- key – question, way to know the secret, new knowledge,
- bridegroom the beast or killer – a symbol of the enemy hiding in the form of someone friendly,
- blood – a symbol of the slaughter of the spiritual aspects of the creative life of a human being,
- bones – a symbol of what cannot be destroyed in any way, the spiritual aspect of life,
- cellar dungeon cave – a symbol of the place of initiation,
- maneuvering, dodging – a symbol of penetrating insight,
- son, spouse, stranger, lover – animus,
- attacker, a man in the dark, terrorist, rapist, bandit, constrictor killer – internal saboteur, symbol of a maturing psyche, a harbinger that you have just discovered or will soon discover the forgotten functions of your psyche, usually appears in dreams when a woman is dissatisfied with her life and needs changes, but also a symbol of a wake-up call related to the problems of the modern world – a danger to civilization,
- ego death – usually at this stage, dreams are full of chases towards dead ends, unborn pregnancies, or cars that don’t want to light up,
- dolls – a symbol of intuition, spirituality, spiritual wisdom,
- clothing – persona, public image,
- water – a symbol of the creator and the way,
- song – inspiration with the spirit of wisdom,
- frozen children, ice – a symbol of being emotionless,
- magic items with unusual properties – a symbol of the body,
- a poor but clever hero – a symbol of a man rich in spirit,
- feet – mobility, freedom
- an old woman – a spiritual guide, dignity, wisdom, self-knowledge,
- seal, wild animals – a symbol of the soul,
- injured animals – relationship with one’s own soul and nature,
- healer – wisdom, knowledge, goodness, caring,
- precious baby – the beginning of a mature spiritual journey.
Clarissa Pinkola Estes “Woman Who run with Wolves” („Biegnąca z wilkami”), Zysk i S-ka Wydawnictwo, Poznań, 2015. http://www.clarissapinkolaestes.com
Mona Chollet „Czarownice. Niezwyciężona siła kobiet.”, Wydawnictwo Kraker, Kraków 2019.
