I have some concerns about the veil. Not just “the veil,” but “The Veil.”
Apparently, it has been thinning for several months now. Possibly years. Every Samhain, certainly. During eclipses. Around full moons. During various astrological events. On numerologically interesting dates. Occasionally on Tuesdays.
At this point, the veil has been thinning so frequently that I am concerned about its structural integrity.
Somebody should probably call maintenance.
I’ve been Pagan for a very long time, and one of the more entertaining developments I’ve watched over the years is the gradual escalation of our spiritual vocabulary. We have always had specialized language, of course. Every religion does. Words help us describe experiences and concepts that don’t fit comfortably into ordinary conversation. Language develops. Also a fact. Cultural influence and growth makes our language an ever-evolving, magnficient tapestry.
But somewhere along the way, it started to feel as though an ordinary mystical experience wasn’t quite enough anymore.
Now everything has to be epic.
We May Be Experiencing a Portal
Portals seem to be particularly abundant.
There are eclipse portals. Lion’s Gate portals. Equinox portals. Solstice portals. New Moon portals. Full Moon portals. Numerological portals when the numbers in the date do something pleasing. Even 11:11 is frequently involved.
I’m not saying there aren’t spiritually significant times. Obviously, I believe there are. I’ve structured enormous portions of my life and practice around cycles, seasons, lunar phases, astronomical events, ritual timing, and the shifting energies I experience throughout the year. I’ve written books about those topics.
I’m just not convinced everything needs to be a portal.
Sometimes Tuesday can just have particularly good energy. If it’s just a good day, it might be independent of a spectacular astrological event and simply be that it was our turn to have a good day.
If we’re opening an interdimensional doorway every time the calendar does something interesting, there’s going to be quite a draft.
I Received a Download
This is another one that fascinates me.
Did you know that people receive downloads now? If you are a senior citizen like I am, it might have gotten past you.
The first few times I encountered the expression, I pictured a progress bar hovering over someone’s head.
Spiritual Revelation — 37% Complete
Please do not turn off your consciousness while enlightenment is installing.
What people are describing, of course, isn’t particularly new. Inspiration, intuition, revelation, sudden understanding, divine communication, gnosis, insight—we’ve had words for these experiences for a very long time. I’ve experienced them myself. Sometimes an understanding arrives with such completeness that I don’t feel as though I reasoned my way toward it. It simply appears.
That’s an extraordinary experience.
Does calling it a download make it more extraordinary?
Maybe for some people it does. Language evolves. Spiritual language certainly evolves, and every generation finds words that make sense within its own understanding of the world.
Still, I occasionally wonder whether we are describing our experiences or marketing them.
In the past, sometimes, our High Priestess was “working on an alternate plane” and subsequently unable to lead a scheduled riutal. Or did she have too much peach brandy that afternoon and was seconds away from passing out for the night?
Congratulations on Your Timeline Shift
Then there are timeline shifts.
This one can become especially confusing because sometimes the evidence that you have shifted timelines seems remarkably similar to the evidence that you have changed your mind.
You leave a relationship.
You change careers.
You stop tolerating something you’ve tolerated for years.
You discover that something you desperately wanted six months ago no longer interests you.
Perhaps you’ve shifted timelines.
Or perhaps you made a decision.
And I don’t say “perhaps you made a decision” dismissively. Quite the opposite.
Decisions are powerful.
Human beings can alter the entire trajectory of their lives by saying yes, saying no, leaving, staying, beginning, ending, risking, refusing, forgiving, or finally admitting something they have known for a very long time.
Why would we need to make that more cosmic?
Changing your life is already a big deal.
Please Remain Calm. The Tower Has Appeared.
Tarot has given us another useful vocabulary that occasionally escapes containment.
Everything difficult is now a Tower moment.
I understand this one. The Tower is such a perfect image for catastrophic disruption that it has naturally become shorthand among people familiar with Tarot.
But not every unpleasant surprise is the Tower.
Sometimes it’s the Five of Pentacles.
Sometimes it’s the Ten of Wands.
Sometimes it’s the Seven of Swords.
And sometimes the washing machine just broke down.
We don’t have to assign a Major Arcana card to the appliance repair.
Unless, of course, the repair estimate arrives.
Then I reserve the right to reconsider.
Mercury Would Like to Speak to His Attorney
Poor Mercury.
Mercury goes retrograde and immediately becomes responsible for every computer glitch, misunderstood text message, delayed flight, misplaced set of keys, malfunctioning appliance, forgotten appointment, ill-advised email, relationship argument, scheduling conflict, and package that FedEx has inexplicably transported through seventeen states despite the destination being twenty miles from the point of origin.
I work magically and astrologically enough to pay attention to Mercury retrograde. I understand the symbolism. I understand why people use those periods for review, reconsideration, revision, and caution around communication.
But Mercury cannot possibly be responsible for everything we have assigned to him.
At some point, Dave simply forgot to answer the email.
Your Twin Flame May Just Be an Asshole
There are places where dramatic spiritual language becomes less amusing.
Relationships are one of them.
The idea that a difficult, painful, unstable, or repeatedly destructive relationship must carry some enormous spiritual significance can encourage us to remain fascinated by situations that might be better understood much more simply.
Twin flame. Karmic partner. Soul contract. Past-life connection. Pre-birth contracts.
Could those things exist?
I certainly won’t tell anyone they don’t.
But sometimes another person is in our life because we met them.
Sometimes we are intensely attracted to someone because chemistry is powerful.
Sometimes a relationship teaches us something because virtually every important relationship teaches us something.
And sometimes the lesson is don’t date that person again.
We don’t need to transform every painful attachment into a cosmic assignment before we’re allowed to leave it.
Ordinary Magic Is Still Magic
Maybe that’s what bothers me about all the escalation.
Not that the concepts are necessarily wrong.
It’s the implication that ordinary experiences somehow aren’t enough.
Intuition isn’t enough; it needs to be a download.
Change isn’t enough; it needs to be a timeline shift.
A meaningful date isn’t enough; it needs to open a portal.
A difficult relationship isn’t enough; it needs to be karmically ordained.
A hard season isn’t enough; it needs to be a dark night of the soul.
A coincidence isn’t enough; it needs to be synchronicity.
A realization isn’t enough; it needs to arrive directly from the Universe with tracking information.
But ordinary magic has always been enough for me.
A candle flame behaving strangely can hold my attention for an unreasonably long time.
A Tarot card appearing at precisely the right moment still makes me laugh out loud. Called out by cardboard.
I can walk outside and feel the season changing before the calendar announces it. I can sit at an altar and know something has shifted without needing to name or prove to anyone what happened. I can have an idea that feels important without knowing whether it came from my subconscious, a God, a spirit, accumulated experience, the Akashic Records, or something I don’t have language for yet.
Mystery doesn’t become more mysterious because we capitalize it.
Magic doesn’t become more magical because we give it a more dramatic name.
Sometimes the quietest experiences are the ones I remember for decades.
Perhaps the Veil Is Fine
I am officially withdrawing my concern about the veil.
I suspect it is doing whatever veils do and has survived our repeated announcements of its imminent dissolution remarkably well.
Use the words that make sense to you. Call it a portal if portal describes what you experience. Call it a download if that’s genuinely what it feels like. Shift timelines. Observe synchronicities. Pay attention to Mercury. Work with the language that gives shape to your spiritual life.
I’m certainly not going to appoint myself Commissioner of Pagan Vocabulary.
I just hope we don’t become so accustomed to looking for the enormous that we lose our ability to recognize the extraordinary hiding inside the ordinary.
Not every spiritual experience has to shake the cosmos.
Not every message has to arrive in capital letters.
Not every moment of change requires the Universe to tear open a hole in space-time.
Sometimes something small happens.
You notice.
Something inside you answers.
And that’s magic enough.
Although if an actual glowing portal opens in my living room, I reserve the right to write an entirely different article.
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As Editor of the Green Egg Blog, Katrina Rasbold weaves ancient wisdom into the complexities of modern life, fostering a space for deep inquiry and magical growth. Katrina is the editor of Green Egg Magazine, a priestess, author, and co-creator of the CUSP path, working from the crossroads of tradition and transformation. She owns and operates Crossroads Occult with her husband, Eric, offering a sanctuary for those seeking mentorship, quality handmade magical items, and authentic craft. Discover her full body of work at www.katrinarasbold.com.