#mod aphrodite!

[solarsnapp]

[id: a redraw of the aphrodite sprite from the second hades game. aphrodite is fat and has curlier pink hair. she holds a spear and a shield. the second image is the transparent version of the piece. end id.]

after a million years, another one :]

[incorrect-hs-quotes]

John: Alright, i give up, which greek hero is polycules and why is every body talking about him?

[doodlingwren]

LeFish.jpg

[cronakillz]

✪aphrodite belova✪

[moddieeeex]

I've been looking at a lot of Olivia Newton-John/Kylie Minogue pics as of late and what can I say, they all felt so dite-core.

Also known as I'm in the middle of moving, amongst other stresses and I needed some chill out time with ma gurl

[blacksapphrodite]

Including Gods in Your Witchcraft

Today, I’m going to talk about something a little different. This topic is something that I tend to consider more in private, and it took me a bit to decide how I wanted to talk about it. The topic? Including gods in your witchcraft, spells, etc. If you’ve flipped through any spellbooks for sale nowadays, or visited any site--including my own--you’ve probably at least seen in mentioned in passing. “Invoke any gods you work with,” or “Call on X”, or “Invoke Y”. Yes, many of these spells might even give you a specific god to work with, and to be honest, that’s something I take a bit of issue with for a number of reasons. 

Now, I’m certainly not going to call myself an expert in this area. I’ve only been working with one goddess--Lady Aphrodite--for a few years off and on, and I’m learning more each day. But my experiences over these few years have certainly led me to form some opinions, and those are what I’m going to share with you today. Working with Lady Aphrodite has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done, and as I dip into the rest of the Hellenic pantheon, I’m excited--but nervous--to share some of my thoughts with you. 

I took my dive into witchcraft when I was in college, so about 9-10 years ago (yikes). When I started looking up spells to try, I was surprised to find that so many spells mentioned call upon some god or another in order to complete the spell. Now, this shouldn’t have been very surprising--a lot of witches are Wiccan, and it makes sense for them to include such things in their spellcraft. This was a bit of a turn off for me, until I learned that witchcraft could be as secular as it is religious to some folks. As someone who was raised in a Black, Christian environment, that made dipping my toes in a little easier. Spells would note that you could take out the invocation or switch out gods to suit your personal taste, and often I would do just that. 

As noted, I started working with Lady Aphrodite a few years ago. I consider my work with her and my exploring Hellenism to be separate from my witchcraft, but sometimes I combine the two. And as I continued to work and learn, it concerned me that some people would mention the invocation of specific gods in spells, almost haphazardly. Why would you instruct someone--especially someone who is probably newish to witchcraft--to call upon a god they likely know nothing about? 

And therein lies my issue. Working with gods is an amazing and humbling experience--your relationship to them might be casual or passing, and it might be deep and personal. But regardless, these are gods. We need to be respectful when approaching them--introductions and offerings are almost a prerequisite in my book. But more importantly, before even that, we need to know who exactly it is we’re calling upon. Gods are not a monolith. They have personalities, likes and dislikes, levels of decorum they expect, and so on. They have eons of history behind them. These are all things we need to take note of before calling upon someone we know nothing about, with no prep work done beforehand. Some gods may be fine with this--many others may not be. Some gods are more dangerous than others. The very least we can do before approaching and invoking a god we know little about is to read about them, properly introduce ourselves, and offer a prayer before asking for their assistance in a spell. 

We also need to note whether or not this is a god/pantheon that’s open to us to begin with. Many religions--such as Voudoun--are closed to outsiders, and yet their gods are thrown around willy nilly as if  they’re open to approach from anyone. This could lead to as small an issue as the spell not working, or as disastrous an issue as offending the god. This isn’t to discourage anyone from including gods in their witchcraft, just an urging to do your research beforehand. Casting a spell isn’t as simple as finding the spell online and following the directions--you need to do some preparation and reading beforehand, to make sure you’re doing it correctly. 

All that being said, gods can be a great aid to spellwork when all the correct steps are taken. There’s certainly nothing wrong with having a god on your side pushing your spell to work for you--though let’s be real, they can be rather unpredictable with the outcomes. :) If you’re considering including gods in your witchcraft, there are a couple of steps you can take: 

If this isn’t a god you work with regularly, do some reading on them. Glance at their wikipedia page, check out some books if you’re able, read articles on them, get to know their history and their stories. 

Introduce yourself! You wouldn’t like it if a stranger on the street came up to you and asked for your help and time with something completely random with no hello or thanks, would you? 

Make an offering as part of your spell, or before your spell--this is why it’s important to read. Find out what they like and how they like it. 

Always say thank you afterwards. 

Depending on how your spell/introductions went, consider working with them more regularly! There could be a relationship there to work on and develop. 

Always be cautious with your spellwork, and respectful in approaching deities--that’s what most of this boils down to. In our rush and excitement to start casting spells or working with gods, we can get careless, and carelessness is dangerous. Better to be knowledgeable and prepared, even if it means slowing down. This is something I wish I’d known more about when I started looking into spellcasting and witchcraft as a whole, so now I’m passing that information down to all of you! I hope this helps, and isn’t too much of a turnoff. It helps to know that witchcraft is just as much studying as it is spellcasting. ;) 

I’ll be doing a lot more posts on deities in the future if I can help it, and with February coming up I plan to try and do some posts on lovely Lady Aphrodite, so keep an eye out for those, and thank you for reading! 

(I'm cleaning up my blog and reposting some of my spells/etc that were once hosted on my website.💕)

[sysboxes]

[Text: This alter’s source is lovecore, My Melody, and Aphrodite.]

Like/Reblog if you save or use

(the dove represents Aphrodite)

[ask-the-skirtz]

Aphrodite is so I Can't Fix You (The Living Tombstone) coded....

[luis-e-sierra]

Aphrodite's Survey Design is awesome, so I started working on a modification of the base skin in Blender (3D Software) to see what it could look like.

I really hope we get something closer to her Survey Concept Design as a Quest Reward Style!

[aphrodite-in-culture]

should i post these with Aphrodite & the caption written in english or as Afrodite and in italian?

[blueberrybunic]

pisces aphrodite // futch

like/rb & credit if using.

[raven-blends]

Day 3- Ares and Aphrodite

Day 3 of @samssims' Mythos March Prompt List

I initially wanted to make Hephaestus for this one, but I couldn't find any good prosthetic limbs for him so I decided to stick with Ares, the God of War. I also had a difficult time with Aphrodite because shes literally the Goddess of Beauty and how are you supposed to create the embodiment of beauty?

WCIF Friendly | ID: revengelovers | Blender Scene: Open! Architecture

[daily-utsu-p]

I should probably fill the queue after work, it's been a while. Any song requests?

[aesthetics-for-harry-potter]

1/2

Moodboard of Fleur Delacour as Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.

Requested by: anon.

[greekgodsexymanbracket]

CHANGE OF PLANS GUYS UM WE ARE POSTING SUBMISSION TOMORROW!!!

[moddieeeex]

I THINK I STRAIGHT UP FORGOT TO POST THIS MONTHS AGO.