The Numinous Podcast

TNP297 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #15 Blessings & Bounty from the Earth

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
Today we're doubling down on our protective plant magic to bolster our spiritual safeness while the veil remains thin. We also look at 'wassail' as a noun, verb, and greeting which is especially appropriate on the 9th night of Yule which is associated with the 9th month of the year – the apple-iest month there is – September.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP296 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #14 Tending to Hearth & Home

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
We're cleansing home and body with medicinal herbs by making vermouth, potpourri and incense in order to finish the year well.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP295 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #13 Balance & Harmony

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
We explore myths related to the beauty of binaries, balance, and cycles of death and resurrection. Some of the myths can help us queer the holidays, others can help us put strained sibling relationships into new perspective. Learn why why ham is such a symbolic meal during this holiday time, and consider some simple rituals to help you bring more balance into your life.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP294 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #12 House Brownies & Tutelary Spirits

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
✨My favourite part of Yuletide!✨ Hearth spirits, house brownies, and protective supernatural allies for homes, barns, and livestock are all propitiated at this time. For me, this seems like a great way to steer children away from the more commercial aspects of this time of year and spark imagination, intuition, and an animist sensibility. A fun ritual for today would be to research what house spirits were called in your family's heritage ✨
 
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP293 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #11 Return of the Light

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
Ancient traditions around the return of the light imply a revival of hope and healing. Pagans created art and apothecary items to reflect the beautiful and harmonious qualities of the cosmos, adorning their homes and bodies to revive the spirit in wintertime.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP292 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #10 Honouring the Child Within {with Bonus Meditation}

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
We honour the children in our lives and the child within us. Plus, more Winter Witches! Woop woop!
Note: The final 4 minutes of this episode is a guided meditation during which you should not be driving, riding a bike, operating machinery or engaged in any activity that requires your full attention.
 
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP291 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #9 The Wild Hunt and the Restless Ancient Dead

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
Ancestral veneration is a key function of winter rituals, a way to put our lineages in good order, encourage harmonious relations with the spirits of the ancient dead, and appease the restless dead who roam at night. On this night, we tell scary ghost stories that might include child-devouring crones, beer-stealing werewolves, dictator dogs and violent Santas. It's also a good day to honour the animal familiars who help convey gifts and goodness including flying goats, female deer, and horse skeletons.
There are also lighter aspects to the day including the reverence of Freya, hanging wreaths, and sacred spinning, weaving and fibre work.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP290 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #8 Father's Night and Spirits of Place

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
This is one of my favourite episodes because cultivating intimacy with the land I live on and the Spirits of Place is one of my favourite things to do. It also addresses, briefly yet deeply, how we can attend to the impacts of imperialism, colonialism, and patriarchy in our spiritual work, especially at wintertime.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP289 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #7 Winter Solstice and the Old Woman of Winter

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
It all begins with the Mother. Tonight on the longest night of the year, we honour our matrilineages and the spiritual lineages of prophesy, blessing, abundance and nurturance passed down through the ages through myths concerning Crones.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP288 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #6 Krampus, Lussi, and Holiday Horror

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
Antifascism for the holidays!
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP287 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #5 Food Lore

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
Inspiration for your holiday kitchen witchery!
 
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP286 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #4 Animal Lore

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
What's the deal with dead bird on Victorian holiday greeting cards? Plus, a rundown of some of the Yuletide bestiary.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
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TNP285 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #3 Plant Lore

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
 
A look at Victorian holiday postcards and the botanicals of winter.
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
✨ Join us in The Numinous Network ✨

TNP284 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #2 Grounding the Season

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
NOTE: This episode contains a 7 minute guided meditation – do not listen while driving or operating machinery! We begin the Yuletide season by grounding into our values and prioritizing just a few rituals, crafts or special foodstuffs. Then we can relax and release pressure to have or provide perfect holiday moments; instead we can deepen into rhythm of winter's work of ritual, ceremony, reflection and restorative pause.
 
Himmeli straw can be found at The Straw Shop
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
✨ Join us in The Numinous Network ✨

TNP283 {REPLAY} Yuletide Miniseries #1 The Anticapitalist Festival of Animism!

Welcome to this fun and convenient replay of my Yuletide Miniseries! In this episode:
Learn about Fumbulvinter, the 12 Days of Yuletide and their themes, and the stories of European Yuletide folklore in my annual program, now available for free! 
Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year (Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft) and Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times
 
✨ Join us in The Numinous Network ✨

TNP282 Electional Astrology with Drew Levanti

People often ask me how I get so much done. Where do I get the time? Electional astrology, that's where.
Working with the natural rhythms of my chart and leveraging action during the most auspicious portals of my year; that's how I keep wasted time to a minimum, and ensure I am more or less always doing what I'm meant to be doing at any given moment. I recognize when my chart is telling me to work, rest, and play, and then I do that. The right things at the right time.
I trust an experienced professional to determine those portals of time for me. Lately I've been working with electional astrologer, Drew Levanti, to help me map out my year.
Drew is an astrologer rooted in the Cascadia region of the Pacific. They weave the mystic, the mythic, and the mathematical roots of astrology, allying with the archetypal cosmos and your own guides to help you soulfully and practically navigate the times at hand. Drew’s love of philosophy, history, and myth permeates his astrological career, from his research to his long-term client relationships and his professional collaborations, including that with one of our previous podcast guests, Kristin Mathis, who was one of the guests during the astromagic miniseries, (ep.203) on Venus and the Orphic Hymns. Drew and Kristin have co-led programs and co-appeared on a number of podcasts discussing ancient astrology and the Orphic Hymns.
 
Check out these awesome offerings from Drew to help you prepare for 2026:
Radical Election Report
Into the Fire: Your 2026 Astro-Download
 
Listen to the AstroMagic Miniseries
 
Astrocartographers I recommend:
Jen Zahrt
Jasmine Richardson
 
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TNP281 "23 Dates with My Dead Dad" with Corey MacAuliffe

Content Warning: Grief, death, substance use, intergenerational trauma, and bereavement.
 
I have a magical story for you today about angels, grief and loss, and receiving signs from our ancestors. My guest today is Corey McAuliffe. She holds a PhD in Social and Behavioural Health Sciences and a Master’s in Public Health. She’s also the author of 23 Dates with My Dead Dad, a grief memoir that chronicles her journey toward reconnecting with her late father and healing from intergenerational trauma.
 
After her father’s death in 2019, Corey transformed their monthly father-daughter tradition into a spiritual practice, tuning into synchronicities and signs. The book weaves together her experiences with chronic illness, ancestral trauma, and a transformative trip to Ireland to explore family history.
 
For many of us, the holiday season is a time of bittersweet memories and melancholy reminiscences…one thing I really appreciated about Corey’s book is that is offered a balance of the practical actual lived reality of a complicated relationship with a parent with the excitement and uplifting energy of asking for signs and tuning into synchronicities and receiving winks from the Universe.
 
It really was a page turner so if you're looking for a memoir that’s one part Eat Pray Love, one part Travelling with Pomegranates, plus a dash of visiting a medium to connect with your Beloved Dead, then have I got a book for you!
 
Buy 23 Dates with My Dead Dad 
 
Join us in The Numinous Network
 
Follow Corey on Instagram and TikTok
 

TNP280 End Perfectionism & People Pleasing with Beatriz Victoria Albina

As we slip more deeply into the holiday season, even the most committed feminist may also be inadvertently sliding into old patterns of over-functioning. Let's pause to refocus, shall we? Beatriz Victoria Albina is a Family Nurse Practitioner, Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, and author of the bestselling book, End Emotional Outsourcing: a Guide to Overcoming Codependent, Perfectionist and People Pleasing Habits.
In this episode, we talk about:
• signs we might be engaging in Emotional Outsourcing (what it is and what it might look like)
• the five Survival Selves – personas we adopt to get along
• a process to engage with boundaries using clear, direct communication
and much, much more!
Béa has a ton of useful resources that I highly recommend you check out.
Follow her on Instagram
She's also the host of the Feminist Wellness Podcast with hundreds of helpful episodes!
✨ ✨ ✨
Learn more about my books, Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times and The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes and Rituals for the Wheel of the Year – Everyday Animism, Folk Magic and Witchcraft

TNP279 Dra.Rocio Rosales-Meza on Decolonial Shadow Work

My guest today is ✨ Dra.Rocío Rosales-Meza ✨ Dra.Rocío is a former academic with a background in counselling psychology who currently works at the intersection of ancestral veneration, decolonization, health – and by that I mean, physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health and wellbeing.
Through her courses and mentoring programs, Dra.Rocío helps people unlearn colonial programming and embody their gifts. As of this recording, registration is currently open for her program, Decolonial Shadow Work, designed specifically for white folks and bi-racial white folks.
Because I’ve followed Dra.Rocío for some time and I’ve seen her quote many of the iconic teachers and revolutionaries that I, personally, find inspiring and instructive – for instance, I’ve seen and heard her reference Frantz Fanon, bell hooks, Assata Shakur, some of the figures I admire most and that most fascinate me in the movement for Black liberation – I thought it would be very worthwhile to have a conversation about decolonizing our minds and hearts and doing the deeper spiritual work needed to become a reliable and useful accomplice and co-conspiritor in the movement towards liberation and justice for all. I hope that whatever your racial identity, you'll enjoy and find something useful and comforting in this conversation.Visit Dra.Rocío's website
Register for Decolonial Shadow Work
 
Learn more about:
Dr.Michael Yellowbird - Neurodecolonization and Indigenous Mindfulness
Assata Shakur
bell hooks
Thích Nhat Hanh
 
Join us in The Numinous Network
Come to my Book Jam! Bringing Contact Nutrition to the Page

TNP278 Story is a State of Mind with Sarah Selecky

Pour yourself a cup of tea or something cozy because my dear friend, Sarah Selecky, and I are going to have a chat about writing.
Sarah’s newest book, Story Is A State of Mind, started as a writing class in her living room in Victoria, BC, 25 years ago, right around the time we met. It has since become a unique example of how the internet has disrupted the classical education system, with her program evolving into an online program now known as the Sarah Selecky Writing School. Her Story Course has been praised by the likes of Margaret Atwood and Zuzie Gartner and her debut short story collection, This Cake is for the Party, was a finalist for what is probably Canada’s most well known literary award, The Giller Prize. Her next book, Radiant Shimmering Light, was optioned by Amy Adams to create a series for HBO. And her latest, Story is a State of Mind: Writing and the Art of Creative Curiosity, is getting buzz in academic circles with profs in MFA programs across the country adding to their required reading lists. 
And we are SO LUCKY to have Sarah back on the program for a third time to help us bring our creative work out into the world.
Listen to Sarah's previous visit to the podcast, ep.102 talking about Radiant Shimmering Light
Listen to episode EIGHT (😮) of The Numinous Podcast: Sarah Selecky on Better Living Through Metaphor
Get your copy of Story is a State of Mind from our wonderful friends at Assembly Press