It came from me. I took it.

My name came from me. I took it. It’s Aerik, by the way, if you missed it all over the rest of my site.

Of course, we’re talking about my craft name. Sure, I’ve got a boring, regular name that was given to me at birth, too.

Why do we choose a craft name? There’s lots of reasons.

Sometimes we don’t really identify with our magickal personas the same way as our mundane, everyday personas. For many of us, the practice of witchcraft marked a significant shift at some point in our life — taking a new name is appropriate to mark that change. It also helps to assume the right mindset prior to entering into a ritual space… when we step into circle, we are leaving the mundane behind and fully becoming the extraordinary part of ourselves.

And of course, there’s the age of tradition of protecting identities. Back in the day, if you never knew anyone’s real name, you could never confess and identify them under duress. Not to say that anyone’s lives are literally in danger anymore, but people’s livelihoods or family relationships sometimes are.

How do we choose a name? That’s a great question. I think I’ll write a post on that soon.

Daily writing prompt

Where did your name come from?

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