My Ritual for Venerating My Ancestors and Loved Ones
↑ ( a spread from my grimoire ) ↑
I’m excited and nervous to bare my soul on this site, but I figured someone might learn a thing or two from my practices. So here we are!
Let’s dive right in…
Spell Components
A candle with corresponding colors. You can choose brown for the element of earth or for ancestry, purple for spirit work, gold for veneration, or white for clarity. Use whatever works best for you.
Anointing oil of your choice.
Herbs and Plants (for me, that’s orange bits, apricot bits, rose and sunflower petals, mugwort for dreams and spirit work, sweet cayenne pepper, lipton black tea). Use what resonates for you and your ancestors.
Rocks and Crystals (for me, that’s pretty rocks I find on a walk outdoors, clear, smoky, and rose quartz, citrine). Use what resonates for you and your ancestors.
Pen and paper. You may choose to have the color of ink and paper be significant to you. Ponder it and do whatever you can or what best suits your practice.
Miscellaneous ingredients (taglocks, jewelry you inherited or were gifted from them, symbols of or literal gifts you received from them in life or in death, charms or trinkets that remind you of them, et cetera).
A jar, bowl, satchet, charm bag, envelop, or some other form of container or vessel.
Offerings! This is incredibly personal to whatever your ancestors enjoy, whether in life or in death. For me, certain ancestors like black tea, some liked rockstar energy drinks, and my family dog gets fresh water. Offerings can be pledges to do devotional acts as well if physical offerings aren’t a possibility to you. For example, my offering can be the intention to grow a sweet cayenne pepper plant for my Wapa. I could pledge to try out crochet for my maternal grandma. I could pledge to dedicate space in my week to read or learn something new and interesting for my paternal grandma. Like I’ve been saying and will continue to say, do what’s best for you and what works for your practice.
A key with which you think you can carve into a candle, and/or just a regular ole inscription tool.
Ritual Walkthrough
Cleanse and awaken your candle. Do what suits your practice, but for me that means cleaning, cleansing, and awakening my candles, and asking them if they’d like to help me and subsequently to help me if they agree. If you can’t tell, I’m a bit of an animist, but if you’re not, just don’t what’s best or customary for you.
Anoint your candle with whatever oil you choose. I have a recipe for ancestor oil planned, otherwise I just use regular, cold pressed sweet almond oil for sweetness, love, and clarity. Anoint however best suits your practice. For me that means rubbing towards myself to invite them down to and toward me. Use that key or inscription tool to carve their first name(s), full name(s), surname(s), or maiden name(s), or whatever name you personally call or called them. I call my grandfather Wapa. It would be weird to call him by his first name. But it may feel and be right for you. Do whatever suits your practice.
Light your candle, placing the key in front of it, and invite the candle to open the doorway between you and your passed loved one(s). Call them by name when you invite them, best done aloud in my practice.
Gather your container (jar, pouch, bowl, bag, envelope) and prepare your ingredients (herbs, rocks, papers and pens). To me, preparing ingredients means holding each one individually in my hands and asking them if they’d like to help me. If they do, I ask them what I need from them. For the paper and pen, I’ll write my prayers and notes to my ancestor(s), memories of them, lessons learned from them, and anything else I want to have written down to use in the spell. Add each ingredient to the bag as you complete this. Note! Don’t seal the container (unless you feel it’s something you should do) because you may want to add or remove items as your relationship grows or if you find they don’t jive with something you’ve added any longer.
Lay out your offerings. Take your container of goodies in your hands and say a prayer of gratitude, of veneration, of appreciation. Some things you may want to include are an introduction to your offerings, inviting them to indulge freely, you may want to include thanks for what they did for you in life, you can include the notion that you want to continue your relationship with them in death. I end my prayer usually by saying some form of “I love and cherish you, now and always.” Do whatever feels right and suits your personal craft and relationship with your ancestor(s).
Place your container of goodies on your altar, if you have one, otherwise just place it in a place where it will be safe and able to be well cared for. Let this spell container serve as an earthly reminder of your veneration and appreciation of your ancestor(s).
When you’ve finished consecrating the spell vessel, communing with the ancestor(s), and praying, extinguish the candle to dismiss them. You don’t want to force them to stick around. Let them know they are free to stay or leave. They may have others to visit, you know. They’re still beings with free will and desires.
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Are you sick of me telling you to do what’s best for your personal practice? No? Good! Yes? Too bad, because that part is incredibly important. Don’t use apricot pits if they mean nothing to you. They have a world of meaning to me. It was the biggest tree in my Wapa’s front yard for a large portion of my childhood, it’s the heart of the fruit, it’s the seed from which a new tree can grow, it’s the hard, sturdy, unwavering part of the soft fruit. But if an apricot pit is just trash to you, so be it! If the idea of offering something as unhealthy or “trashy” as an energy drink revolts you, then just don’t offer it! It reminds me of a time before my grandma started shaping up in her health habits. It reminds me of that time, not actually the bad habit, but of memories we shared during the time that align with the time before she broke that habit. Plus she may want to indulge in an old vice, and who am I to judge that?
Also, for me, ancestor work doesn’t only have to be for the dead. I know that sounds a bit weird, but the definition of ancestor doesn’t specially state that they have to be deceased to be an ancestor. Plus, right now I live over a thousand miles from my grandparents who are still with me. I want to honor and venerate them in magical way as well as in a mundane way, like facetiming them, texting them, sending them snail mail, et cetera. I want to give them things I can’t simply post in the mail or just say with words. So I include living ancestors in my magical workings.
Again, I’m very nervous to be sharing such a personal ritual of my practice, so please remember to be kind and use my words with care. Don’t just blindly follow me. Soul search and discover what works best for you in your practice involving your ancestors.
Thanks for reading and let me know if you learned something or enjoyed sharing a bit of my practice with me! May your journey be a blessed one!
