Building the Ceremonial Altar: Tools, Space, and Intention
A candle is wax and wick until intention is placed behind lighting it. A stone is mineral until it's been chosen, deliberately, to represent something specific to you in that particular working.
Junk Magic
What do you wish to achieve? When you know this first, you work with the magic and elements available to you rather than trying to create some interesting mystical tableau of artifacts and rituals and clouds of smoke.
Begin your magical workings with an intention. It can be really, super specific like “I want to overcome my addictions” or “I’d like to honor this ancestor who recently passed” or “I’d really like to be in a nicer and more comfortable home within a year.” Or it can be general: “I’d like to raise this community”, “I wish to be more grounded” or “I want to generate abundance.”