How to Use Magick Spells to Positively Affect the Presidential Election – and Why You Should

Many Wiccans and Pagans use spell work and magick for personal issues without ever applying them to larger, global problems. Those that do, though, tend to cast overly broad spells. They work magick to heal the environment, or bring about world peace. Those are ambitious goals, but spell casting works better with a more narrow focus. Large effects are more easily achieved by taking several small steps -- like eating an elephant one bite at a time. If we are to be truly responsible for creating the world as we want it to be, then we need to prioritize magickal work on government and current events, choosing very specific political goals.

The main political problem on everyone’s mind right now is the Presidential election, particularly the heavily contested democratic primary. However, the suggestions I make here will work equally well for the general election, once the democratic nominee has been selected. These spells are not meant to take the place of active participation in the mundane political process. Rather, they act as a spiritual supplement that boosts the effectiveness of those efforts, and provide a psychological boost to help keep you fighting for what you believe.

I’m going to assume most of you reading this have already made up your minds whom to support in the democratic primary. I also assume you are strongly in favor of one candidate, or strongly opposed to the other. If you plan on voting for John McCain in the general election, I’m betting on the latter. However, though I recognize not all Pagans follow the particularly Wiccan ethic of “an it harm none, do what ye will,” I am going to stick to spells here that focus on positive results for the candidate you favor, rather than negative results for the candidate you want to lose. I also want to stress that any magick you do should, first and foremost, have the good of the country and its citizens as its primary goal, not promoting any one candidate to the position of President at any cost.

The first and most important step of any spell work is planning its purpose. On one side of a piece of paper, brainstorm a list of all the good things that have been happening that favor your candidate. On the other side, list all the negative things that have been tarnishing the candidate’s image or losing him or her support. Then decide whether you want to do one very specific spell to deal with one particular positive or negative, or one larger ritual designed to boost all the positives, generally, or neutralize all the negatives. Give this a lot of thought; your decision dictates the intent with which you charge the spell, and your ability to focus on a very specific intent is the essential ingredient to the success of your magick.

Second, decide on the kind of magick that will work best for your intent and your inclination. If you are ambitious and want to do a full-scale ritual to cover many positives or negatives, make sure you have the time to devote to planning and execution; the ability to acquire all the magickal tools that you will want to use; and a location that will give you the room and privacy you need to work, for the length of time you will need. If you don’t have that kind of attention span, and prefer to do something fast and simple, then a quick spell involving candle magick or some form of elemental work might be better for you. Just make sure it’s a method you have affinity for. If you are a water baby and hate working with fire, then stay away from candle magick. For ideas, try looking through Raymond Buckland’s Practical Candleburning Rituals or Scott Cunningham’s Earth Magick .

Third, work out all the details of symbolism for your spell to make it most effective for your purpose and your psyche. For example, if you are using candle magick, you want to choose a color of candle that symbolizes your purpose, based on your own personal symbol set. Many Americans associate the color green with money, for instance, so if you want to boost fundraising, that might be a good color to use. Some people prefer gold for that purpose. Make sure you choose a color that has the strongest emotional association for you, personally. Use the same internal logic to decide on which scented oil, if any, to dress the candle with; which herbs or powders to rub over the dressed candle or sprinkle around the base; what symbols to carve onto the candle; whether to put a prayer, affirmation, or other statement of your spell focus on a piece of parchment to be placed under the candle as it burns; etc. I would like to stress that all these symbols are merely tools to help you focus your intent. Not a one of them is necessary to spell work. You can do the entire thing in your imagination, if your concentration and visualization skills are well-developed. If you don’t feel quite that confident, but don’t have the money or the time to go shopping, then a simple white candle decorated with symbols drawn in the appropriately colored marker will work perfectly fine.

Fourth, using the decisions you made in step three to make a shopping list, go buy or otherwise acquire and assemble in one place all the items you will need for the spell. You can do the spell immediately, as soon as you’ve gotten everything together. Or you can set a date and time for the spell based on time of day, astrological sign, planetary alignment, significance of the day of the week, phase of the moon, etc. Don’t worry about doing this unless you feel it will boost your belief in the efficacy of the spell. The last thing you want to do is get into the mind set that you have to do all of it, and have everything “right” or “perfect,” for your spell to work. That only handicaps your spell and your own power. All power from magick comes from you and your focus of will. Don’t let anyone take your power away from you by telling you different.

Fifth, if you have a particular deity, angel, or guardian entity whose energy you would like to draw upon, ask for their guidance and help. If there is an entity that seems particularly appropriate for the kind of spell work you are doing or its purpose, ask them for help, too.

Sixth, if you want to chant, pray, sing or drum while working your spell, either decide in advance what you’re going to say or do and script it, or improvise in the moment, letting the words come to you spontaneously; both are powerful methods. You can do any of that out loud or silently, in your own head. You may have gathered from all this preparation that your magick has already started, and is going strong, long before you actually start the spell proper. That’s the point – magick is about focusing your energy and intention on your purpose, and everything that you think and do to manifest that purpose is part of that magick.

Finally, work your spell from start to finish. Hold your candidate in your mind, and see him or her surrounded in the positive energy of your spell work. Imagine the outcome that you want the spell to accomplish, and send all the good and hopeful emotional energy that you’ve been accumulating into that mental image and the components of the spell in front of you. When you feel the intensity of that energy tapping out, give it one more intense emotional burst, and release it to the Universe. Wiccans would typically close with a proviso along the lines of “for the good of all, harming none, so mote it be.” That is simply to account for the possibility that we are all human, and can never know everything there is to know about a situation, so we ask the Universe to ensure that no harm comes to anyone from our spell because of our ignorance of circumstance.

Once you have finished your spell, the most important thing you can do to ensure its success is let it go. Don’t worry about whether it worked, because doubts running through your mind are the opposite energy to that which you used in preparing the spell, and thus detract from its effectiveness. The more invested we are emotionally in having a spell work, the more likely we are to worry about whether it did, so it’s usually best to just put it out of your mind and forget about it. If you think about it at all, do it by noticing positive stories in the news that you can attribute to your spell. You don’t have to claim that those things happened solely because of your magick, but by drawing a correlation in your own mind between your spell and subsequent positive events, you are both boosting your belief in your own power, and adding the energy of that positive attention to your magick.

Don’t make the mistake, however, of simply doing a spell and then forgetting about the election entirely, thinking that you’ve done your bit. Magick is most effective when it is used in conjunction with physical, real world action. Doing a spell to find a new job, for example, won’t generally work unless you are also actively searching through want ads and going on interviews. Doing a spell in conjunction with those activities, however, dramatically increases your likelihood of finding a more appropriate job, a better job, a higher paying job, or finding one faster. The psychological effect alone does wonders for your attitude.

So get out there, and canvass for your candidate. Man a phone bank. Send in a donation. Post a comment at a blog listing his or her positive traits and qualifications. Take substantive action to make your desired outcome a reality. Take responsibility for creating the world as you want it to be. That is the only true purpose of magick, and everything we do in alignment with that goal, from voting, to marching, to writing a letter to the editor, is a magickal act.

Good luck, blesséd be, and may the best candidate win.

For a complete example spell, see A Simple Candle Spell to Support Your Presidential Candidate