There’s a big belief that when working magick, candles should never be blown out. Its said that you’re blowing away your magick and luck, that it’s counter-productive to your work, that it’s wasting the energy.

Well, I gotta disagree. I blow my candles out, and I think it only adds to the power.

It’s an incredibly intimate, powerful act to blow out a magickal candle flame. Think about it – our breath is sacred. It is a representation of our life force, our unique inner power. Blowing on the flame that has been burning and raising energy is a divine way of marking the magick with our signature. Its adding that final burst of energy and personal power to the spell as you send it out. We are divine creators, literally transmuting the energy of the flame – building, burning – into smoke – releasing, flowing, dispersing and blending. We are adding our power, our energy, our intention to the universal web of magick.

And if we think about it, adding air to fire can only improve the energy, right? Fire literally would not exist without air, without oxygen. Air is essential to the creation and growth of fire. So by blowing out the flame, we’re feeding the energy as we send it out, just like flowing onto embers help feed it and grow it into a bonfire. Instead of extinguishing the magick, we’re enhancing it.

Metaphorically speaking, blowing out the candle flame is representative of sending the magick out into the universe to do its thing. Magick doesn’t thrive when contained; why should the magick of your spell be any different? When you blow out a spell candle, imagine you are firmly but lovingly directing the energy outward and onward – we do this with wands and athames during ritual, to release the spell and do its work. Its the same concept. You’re Mama Bird, releasing your baby from the nest so she can fly on her own and come back to you, job done, improved and emboldened.

It also helps that the rising smoke from blowing out a candle is visual and visceral; so much of magick is about aesthetics. We use tools, wear garb, eat special foods, and speak pretty words not because those thing inherently hold more power, but because they put US in a position of holding more power. They create sacred space for us to do the work. Think of a place that feels truly magickal to you – its not each individual item in that place that is creating the magick, but a sum of its parts literally changing how you feel, how you vibrate in that moment. We could manifest our will simply by thinking it, but that’s HARD. The tools of the trade we surround ourselves with help to shift our mindset to one of power, but it’s all in the power of aesthetics. That’s what the swirling smoke is doing too.

Even if you still don’t believe in blowing out your flame, try to find an alternative to snuffing. Snuffing out the candle is really what’s detrimental to the spell; it’s slowly suffocating the magick, containing the energy instead of sending it out to do its work! The energy remains, stagnant, not evolving or transmuting or growing or returning. If you can’t bring yourself to blow, at least consider using another element (salt, water, etc) to extinguish the flame. Or better yet, put the candle someplace safe and let it burn out naturally. Snuffing, in my mind and my practice, is one of the worst ways to end a spell. You’re literally suffocating the magick, not releasing it!

I’m #TeamBlow (and yes, the pun is intended); are you? Let me know down below.