How to Make a Magic Wand
It’s far better to craft our own magical tools, because of the energy that transfers from ourselves into the tool as we work on it. It becomes an extension of us as we work. (With store-bought wands, this process takes a much longer time and more use, IMO.)
The Witch’s wand is the tool she uses to channel power from the otherworld, into this world. Now, as we know, the witch herself is the real channel. She is the tree with her branches (higher self) in the upper worlds, her roots (ancestors, past lives) in the lower worlds, and her body in the middle worlds, this one we all inhabit.
So, traditionally, the wand is made of wood, and it should be one of the 9 ‘Cauldron Woods.’
The 9 woods are: Apple, Ash, Hazel, Holly, Oak, Pine, Thorn (Hawthorn,) Willow, Yew.
Elder is suggested as the most sacred of all.
The old words say,
Nine woods in the cauldron go,
Burn them fast and burn them slow,
But Elder be the Lady’s tree
Burn it not, or cursed you’ll be!
Here is how our some of our most learned teachers describe the vibrations of the ten sacred woods.
Apple: Venus. Love, healing, gardening, immortality, silver branch, silver bough, fruit of the underworld, fruit of the gods.
Ash: Sun. Healing, fire, prosperity, the sea, health, protection
Hazel: Mercury. Wisdom, Divination, protection, fertility, anti-lightning, luck, wishes.
Holly: Mars. Protection, luck, anti-lightning, dream magic.
Oak: Sun. Protection, health, money, healing, potency, fertility, luck
Pine: Mars. Healing, fertility, protection, exorcism, money
Thorn (Hawthorn): Mars. Fertility, chastity (I don’t get how those things go together, but okay) abundance, wisdom, happiness
Willow: Moon. Love. Healing. Pregnancy & childbirth. Women. Cycles. Psychism. All things water.
Yew: Saturn. Raising the spirits of the dead, talking to the dead, necromancy, spirit communication, all things death and underworld. (Poison)
Elder: Venus. Exorcism, protection, healing, sleep, is said to hold witches and spirits within its wood, and it “bleeds” red when cut. NEVER BURN. An Elder wand would need to be cared for, nay, cherished. This is a serious wand, not for the meek or the beginner. If you’re not ready for this wand, however, you won’t find a branch anyway. And I wouldn’t cut one.
Use this guide (and others) to decide what sort of want you want. I recommend you use one from a tree that can be found in your vicinity. You might need to do some research to learn how to recognize each of the trees. Pine, for example, is not the same as spruce.
It doesn’t HAVE to be one of the 9 trees. You can use any tree that feels right to you. Look up its energies and do everything else the same.
Spend some time in meditation beneath the tree, ideally leaning your back against its trunk. This is the best way to understand the energy of that wood and how it resonates with your own. If you feel discord, you have not choosen the right tree.
Decide, but DO NOT CUT A BRANCH.
The old wisdom says…
Go to the tree, commune with it, leave an offering, and then ask permission to saw off a limb to make a magic wand.
Screw that.
Hey, if I walk up to you hand you a cookie, and then ask I can saw off your arm, in a language you do not speak, and you say NO in a language I don’t understand, and I proceed to saw off your arm, what part of that is sacred? What part is non-violent? What part is loving, positive energy? What tree would EVER say yes?
Never happened. To my mind, that’s make-believe, because one has no way of knowing whether the tree has granted permission.
I am serious about natural magic. It’s a science: the understanding and manipulation of vibration. And it’s an art, as well. But it is not make-believe.
So please don’t violently amputate a limb from a tree that can’t say no. You don’t want that energy in your wand.
Instead, find trees of the type you want, once you’ve decided based on the vibration you want. And then visit them until you find a perfect branch lying on the ground underneath one of them. That’s as close to consent as you’re likely to get, and even then, the tree would say, “No. Let it decompose and nourish my roots as nature intended.”
Meditate under that tree, and take that branch.
Leave an offering that compensates for what you took. This is the energy of reciprocity and if it doesn’t underly your magic, nothing else will be any good. For all we take, we must also give equally or more.
A shovel full of compost mixed with some soil so it’s not too strong, spread around the base of the tree but not touching its bark is a beautiful and meaningful offering that more than compensates for the branch you removed.
Length and girth
I was taught the perfect length for a wand, is the length from the inner bend of your elbow to the tip of your middle finger. (Or longest finger, if the middle is not the longest—but if your forefinger is longer, lore says you might be a werewolf. Just so you know. I’m here to educate, after all. You’re welcome. And aaaooooooo!
If it’s too long, trim it on the spot along with any smaller branchlets, leaving the trimmings on the ground beneath the tree.
The thickness or girth of the branch, I am told, should be about that of your thumb.
I have made thicker and thinner wands, and I think a little thicker than my thumb is my preference, as they’re less breakable.
Take the branch. Tell it why. Leave the offering. Thank nature for co-creating with you.
Work on the branch
If it’s fresh, let it dry slowly, near a mild heat source, like a register or radiator. When you can peel the bark, it’s dry enough. It might take a few weeks. I was taught to wait one full cycle of the moon.
Peel the bark. Save for later.
Get some rough sandpaper, large grain, and rub, rub, rub. Study each knot in the branch, and decide whether you want to sand it down or keep it. Sometimes, I’ll hold the wand, and find that my thumb or forefinger rest perfectly upon the knot as if it were made for that purpose. Those, I leave.
Gather all the bark and sawdust and bits from the branch and save them to be burned or added to your compost (or buried, if it’s elder) later on.
Decorate the branch
My favorite method is a little wood-burning tool. I make spirals, as if to spin the energy as it moves through the wand, building up velocity. I add leaves, because it had them once.
You can paint or stain or oil or poly the branch. You can attach a quartz point to the business end, if you want. You can wrap a pleather thong around the handle for added grip. You can dangle things from it, dropped feathers and stones. You are limited only by your imagination.
As you work on the branch, you’ll be melding your energy with it, so be sure you only work on it when you are in an excellent state of mind and high vibration. And then really feel your energy melding with that of the wood, and feel its energy too.
Engrave your initials personal sigil (which you create yourself, so go for it) and the symbol of the element this wand represents to you. In some traditions of the craft, that’s air, and in others wands are fire.
In my tradition they’re air, so I would engrave the symbol for air, an upright triangle with a line through it.
SIDEBAR: One tome I read claimed that novice witches were taught the wands/fire, swords/air associations to keep them from doing harm, should they leave the coven. Only after first initiation, or possibly even after elevation to the second or third degrees, were they given the correct wands/air, swords/fire combination, and that over time that tradition became forgotten, and people thought you could choose whichever association worked for you. But that one was correct, and the other, a red herring.
The Wand Ritual
On the next full moon after the wand is ready, set up a full altar with representations of the elements at the four positions: salt in the north, incense in the east, a candle in the south, water in the west.
Bless the altar in your own way. Cast a circle in your own way. Invoke the elements in your own way. But however you do it, you should use the invoking pentacles by drawing them in the air facing the corresponding direction.
*Always retrace the first line drawn.
Take the branch to the altar.
First, pass the branch through the incense smoke.
“Creature of wood, sister-child of Earth,
Of perfect length, and perfect girth”
Next, pass it through the candle’s flame.
“Abide with me and be my friend
As magic we wield and reality bend”
Scatter salt over the branch.
“We’ll channel the might of myriads unseen
To empower my will, and send forth its beam”
Sprinkle the branch with blessed water.
“We’ll cast and conjure light as one
With love to all, and harm to none,
And as I will, so now it’s done.”
Next, carry the wand to each of the quarters. Hold it up, and introduce it, and ask for the blessings of each element to be imbued into the wand.
“Oh mighty North, element of Earth, this is my wand. Bless her with your powers of stability and strength and imbue her with the magic of Earth.”
“Oh mighty East, element of Air, this is my wand. Bless her with your powers of quickening and light and imbue her with the magic of Air.”
“Oh mighty South, element of Fire, this is my wand. Bless her with your powers of action and change and imbue her with the magic of Fire.”
“Oh mighty West, element of Water, this is my wand. Bless her with your powers of healing and transformation and imbue her with the magic of Water.”
Carry her to the center. Holding her up, recite the Witches Rune. (Print it up ahead of time, but to be honest, any student of mine would know it by heart. So learn it. (The second version given at the link fits perfectly to the melody of Scarborough Faire. So sing it if you like.)
As you do this, really feel the energies you are invoking. Breathe them into you. When you exhale, breathe all that energy into the wand. (Trees absorb what we exhale and produce what we inhale.)
Finally, seal the energy by using the wand, to cast its first spell.
If you don’t have one in mind, try just using it to close the quarters and take up the circle.
Move around the circle with the wand in your projective (usually your dominant) hand pointed outward. Draw the banishing pentacle in the air for each element as you thank it and wish it farewell. Remember, you always retrace the first line when using these signs. Here they are again.
Then take up the circle with your receptive (usually your non-dominant) palm downward. Absorb the energy up into that palm and right through you into the wand in your other hand, and then blast it from the wand, out into the world in the form of unconditional love.
When you finish, ground and center. Wrap your wand in cloth and keep it in a safe special place. Have a grain based snack.
Use your wand often. Magical tools lose their charge if not used regularly.
Enjoy!
Sound up!Ready, Set, BINGE!