Hey Chicken! I'd like your help with getting some perspective
There's a prosperity candle working I made and did once that worked decently well the first time I did it, but then because the outcome it brought was small in scale (it brought in a work project that brought a small amount of money, once-off), I set about tweaking it so that the spell outcomes would be bigger (ergo, more money, more regularly)
Problem is, the tweaked versions simply did not hit at all.
For additional context, the OG working was pretty simple (speaking directly to the herbs and working them) and the later versions involved planetary invocations and specific instructions and milestones for the working (e.g. Invoking planetary energies and angels, and specifically saying working must bring at least $xyz per month via business income, and xyz number of new clients)
My question is: can it happen that a working just fails because the working itself is only able to accommodate simple outcomes, and that if I want more detailed/complex outcomes I gotta completely rework it entirely to accommodate that complexity?
Or is it a matter of "more complexity, more energy and better working/ritual programming for the spell is required"?
I don't think I could really hazard a guess but these would be my first thoughts:
Planets are maybe not the most out-of-the-box power you could work with, in that how well planetary powers works for any individual can vary quite a bit. And to integrate/harness that power might require things like planetary initiations (which to me are somewhat like formal introductions, request for tutelage, etc).
In my practice, talking to an herb and asking it for help is very unlike a formal evocation of a planetary power. One lives in the ground and the other lives in the sky. That's like, two separate directions.
It sounds like you're still doing a candle spell, but instead of working with a plant ally you switched to planetary evocations, which to me would constitute an entirely different spell (of course, it depends on how you slice it).
Invoking something bigger and badder isn't necessarily an avenue of power. Consider that as the practitioner you're the bottleneck: if your skill level caps out at being able to raise and direct, say, 100 units of power, it doesn't matter if you switch from a plant willing to provide 1500 units of power or a planet that could provide 15,000 units of power.
Another level of difficulty in working with planetary powers is drawing them into spellcasting space; we can bring a bit of plant matter in no problem, but to effectively work with planetary powers a person might need not only proper timing but also perhaps talismans or other avenues of connection.
If I were in your shoes I'd consider these avenues of troubleshooting:
Examining if prerequisite skills are up to the task of raising and controlling much greater amounts of energy
Whether or not you were doing things when working with the herb that you stopped doing when you brought in the planets (like, maybe going deeper into magical headspace and focusing on the power of your words, whereas with the planets you just read hymns off a sheet and weren't dwelling with your power)
Returning to the original format of the spell and experiment with supercharging or other methods to attempt to obtain desired goals
Switching spell formats to something more long-lasting (in my paradigm, candle spells really just don't create ongoing cyclical effects like the kind you seem to want; I'd be more inclined to try something like a spell jar)
Examining your natal chart to see if the planets you're calling on are particularly poorly appointed for you
Researching planetary magic to ensure you're actually calling the correct planet for your purposes
Examining planetary invocation techniques and investigating whether or not you'd be served by additional magical techniques (planetary initiations, establishing formal working relationships, etc)
Switching spell formats: keep what works (speaking over the herb) and bring the planet in as a supporting power to open roads and provide energy, and see if that has any impact on your spell at all.
Calling those same planetary powers for other situations to see if they way you're working with them has any effect at all.
Trying to obtain a deeper working relationship with the plant ally and learning from it how to obtain the results you desire
