Witchcraft basics

Altars

^my messy af altar

Happy Hanukkah to all my Jews out there!

Altars are probably one of the most useful things in witchcraft. Altars have many different uses. It depends on your intention for that altar. But to put it simply, altars are basically sacred spaces. 

You can use altars to show gratitude, you can use it to store all of your magickal objects, you can have different altars for different types of witchcraft. Most witches start with a personal altar, and the they start making more as they need them. Like an astrology altar, or an altar dedicated to a deity, etc

Altars are different from shrines and temples. Shrines are usually only for deities and it's kinda like an altar, only its not a space for working with the deity. it's only a space for worshiping them (you work with a deity at an altar for them). Temples are a place or worship. Kinda like a shrine. It's hard to explain.

It is recommended that you have something to represent the 4 elements (or 5) on your personal altar. So a feather or bell for air, water or seashells for water, candles or incense for fire, crystals or dirt for earth, you get the point. 

Most people keep an altar cloth on their altar.

You can make a tiny travel altars in a mint tin (most witches still in the broom closet do this). here's a video on how you can do this

You can make an online altar, like a board on Pinterest or in a video game. Lots of witches in the broom closet find this helpful too (i can't explain how to do this, as i've never done it myself. But i do know it's possible.)

You could make an altar in a shoe box (witches who don't have much space do this)

You can make altar on a shelf

I have heard of witches in the broom closet turning their entire room into one giant altar.

There is so much more information on altars out there. This is only the basics, and even then I feel like this doesn't have enough info in it