Enchantment Learning & Living Blog

Welcome to Enchantment Learning & Living, the inspirational space where I write about the simple pleasures, radical self-care, and everyday magic that make life delicious.

Practically Pagan ~ An Alternative Guide to Magical Living Book Release!

Three years ago, I published my first book, Everyday Enchantments, a collection of musings on ordinary magic and daily conjurings. It has been a whirlwind of delightful literary magic ever since. That was the book that helped me rediscover my inner bruja and so will always have a place in my heart. But I’m also excited to look back and see how I’ve grown, developed, and continued to hone my craft as a writer, magical practitioner, and human being. That’s what everyday magic is all about: showing up every day to conjure a better way of being.

After years of blogging and that first book, it became clear that that there were other people out there, like me, looking for simple, practical ways to make their lives more magical. Thus, Practically Pagan ~ An Alternative Guide to Magical Living was born.

This is an alternative and practical guide to magical living, which means it’s a no-fuss approach to finding the mystic in the mundane. Here, there are no difficult spells with obscure ingredients, complicated rituals, or expensive tools. Instead, you’ll find that our routines are the rituals, the meals we cook are the edible spells, as are the thoughts and intentions we cast out into the world. As for crystals, athames, and velvet cloaks…those are cool, sure, but you don’t need them to conjure. All you need, in fact, is an open mind and a desire to find enchantment wherever you go.

Get your copy here.

Advanced Praise

“I'm new to practicing, so this was incredibly helpful. I loved reading ways to expand my practice and the best part is how easy everything is. It's perfect for a beginner.” ~ Kali T. Netgalley Reviewer

“What a beautiful book! I loved reading about enriching my witchcraft practices with solid acts of self-care.” ~ Sonja K. Netgalley Reviewer

“I love the way that this book weaves magic and wonder into the everyday, making paganism feel accessible to everyone. I'm going to try to reframe household chores as a form of magic!” ~ Melanie K. Netgalley Reviewer

“This book was everything I could have hoped for. DeBlassie approaches magic in a way that is less intimidating and much more natural, at least to me. The focus on intention as magic and having less focus put on complex spells and rituals makes this book both beginner-friendly and something that can re-ignite the passion for longtime practitioners.” ~ Colleen V. Netgalley Reviewer

"Practically Pagan ~ An Alternative Guide to Everyday Magic is an accessible guidebook into the subject of personal development and subtle magic, providing the reader with tips to live their best, most blessed life."
Jennifer Teixeira - Author of "Temple of the Bones; Rituals to the Goddess Hekate"

"Everyday magic is not just about developing connections and relationships with our spiritual and magical selves. How many of us have looked within at our own habits and behaviors to acknowledge the chaos and stress within our own lives and how we can change our thinking and break out of these toxic behaviors that hinder us on many levels. Maria from her own personal experience shares how she turned her life around earning a happier, healthier life, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. This naturally brought back that spiritual energy and personal power that was buried beneath the drudgery of the modern lifestyle. This is everyday magic and can improve the lives of EVERYONE." ~ Martha Gray, author

"Maria's Practically Pagan: An Alternative Guide to Magical Living is a book that I wish my younger self could have read. Instead of wandering around, thinking magic needed to be elaborate and, therefore, inaccessible, I could have seen the magic in the everyday. (And to be fair, I need the reminder now too.) In addition, the fact that Maria touches on toxic patriarchy, performative extroversion, and mindless busy-ness as things to unlearn is vital. Necessary. Crucial. Timely. I can hear the passion behind the words of this book, and it feels like a spell woven between the words and the reader."

~ Irisanya Moon, author of Pagan Portals: Reclaiming Magick, Pagan Portals: Aphrodite: Goddess of Love & Beauty & Initiation; Practically Pagan: An Alternative Guide to Health & Well-being, and Pagan Portals: Iris - Goddess of the Rainbow & Messenger of the Godds.

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From the Back Cover

Practical tips for the modern mystic by bruja and award-winning writer and educator, Maria DeBlassie.

This guide is full of proverbial spells, daily conjurings, and mystical insights designed to help those in search of a little more magic in their day-to-day life, no complicated spells, expensive accessories, or experience required.

That's the thing about everyday magic: it's always within reach, within the self, and in the world. Only not in the way readers might normally think. It's a less mumbling 'double double toil and trouble' over a cauldron and more cooking a delicious soup in a beloved cast iron pot. It's simple. It's mundane. It's magic!

This book offers grounded mystical practices, including how to turn routines into healing rituals, to teach readers how to connect to themselves, the Universe, and the magic of everyday life. Journey into the realm of pleasure magic, radical self-care, synchronicity, and the profound joy of living a life beyond the expected with this alternative guide to daily mystic practices.

After all, true magic is in the everyday.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

The Bodice Ripper Cocktail: Or, a Toast to Romance Novels

Confession: I love trashy novels covers. Old pulp covers and fuschia-tinted romances. I mean the over-the-top ones with Fabio-heroes with half-open shirts and long hair more luscious than my own. The ones with heroines in the throws of passion so intense their very clothes seem to melt off them. If there’s a pirate ship in the back, a carriage (which has no doubt seen a lot of action), or some obscenely large manor in the background, then I’m done for. Dragons flying in the distance? Be still my heart!

Here’s the thing, though. It wasn’t until fairly recently that I started to voraciously read these books. Sure, I’d picked up a few slim Harlequins and thumbed through the scandal-ridden pages of mid-century pulp. I’d even read a few Nora Roberts books. But most of my romance novel reading happened within the confines of my dissertation work on The Courtship Novel.

You know the one: The Jane Austen-Personal-is-Political-Subversive-Feminist-Slice-of-Life stuff. I found my home in reading these stories by, for, and about women negotiating a patriarchal world without the financial resources to give everything the finger. I was a lowly grad student, dependent on my professors’ approval for my future success, all of which hung on earning my doctorate. I wasn’t grand enough to be a George Sand and flaunt social rule, simply because I wasn’t a rich noblewoman.

No, I was confined to the social constraints of mere working mortals. I also lacked the desire to throw caution to the wind and run away to live the life of a vagabond writer like Mary Shelley. I like my family, probably because they are a deal less gothic than Shelley’s. And I’m pretty domestic, resembling a hobbit more than a reckless heroine, one who goes on adventures here and there with the sure and comforting knowledge that there is always Bag End to return to with all its books, and flowers, and good food.

So there I was, a mestiza from the desert southwest, roughly fifteen years ago now, reading 18th- and 19th-century British courtship novels. In them, I found young women like me, both pushing against social norms and wanting to find their home in them, eager to live a life that was luscious and full in a world that seemed determined to fence me in. My complicated relationship to my own mixed-raced cultural heritage—a product of colonization and a history of violence—left me in search of stories with happy endings for women like me. I found my answers, at least in part, in these domestic tales by, for, and about women.

I wrote about Mary Wollstonecraft and the transgressive nature of the Female Intellectual, along with the interpenetrative nature of sexual and intellectual stimulation. I explored my own complicated relationship to my sexual and intellectual identity as a brown woman in the white city of Seattle, grappling with the realities that my body would always be politicized, sexualized, and scrutinized no matter what I did. That I would often be highly visible when I most wanted to be invisible. And I discovered that I could use the liminal space I occupied as an empowering sphere in which I could redefine what it means to be a successful woman of color. I wrote very smart things about all this too. And used big words and serious expressions so that others knew that what I said was smart and that I was to be taken Very Seriously.

All the while, in secret, I collected books with saucy covers and devoured trashy novels of all genres every chance I could get. I gobbled up urban fantasy, sword and sorcery, paranormal, steampunk, cozy mysteries… literally anything and everything that would let me escape the hell that is graduate school, at least temporarily.

Then something strange happened. I found I had very little interest in stories that didn’t have some sort of love plot, however tangential. I mean, as someone studying the history of western sex and gender ideologies and their choke-hold on modern life (regardless of your cultural orientation), I understood the importance of having female-centered stories that weren’t about love and that didn’t end in marriage…but I just didn’t care.

I wanted romance. The kind that made you fall in love with life and fell like you were the heroine of your own story. Stories that reminded me that I was blood and bone and feelings. Not just a brain. I was desperate to remember what it felt like to be in love with life and reveled in having a space where emotions and instincts were valued.

I could let down my guard in these stories. I didn’t have to worry about being a hysterical brown woman every time I had An Emotion. These stories taught me that my feelings (so often suppressed or contained) were telling me something important and that I needed to listen to them. They told me that my desire to love and enjoy my body was separate from the white gaze that hyper-sexualized me. They allowed me to separate my desire for romance from the social pressures to Hurry Up and Find a Mate Already. And they reminded me that I didn’t just have to sacrifice my personal life in order to be successful in my professional one, or vice versa. That was a lie mainstream culture told to keep minority bodies down. These books, in short, became my proverbial conduct manuals for the kind of life I wanted to craft for myself once I earned my doctorate.

Plus they were fun! At a time when I felt like I had to keep a firm grip on every thought, emotion, or action in order to be taken seriously, these books were an escape. I could go from being a struggling Dom at the University of Washington to a willing Sub within the covers of these books and enjoy every minute of it. (I would later learn that this was a big part of the appeal fo these books for working women in the 80s and beyond.) In short, these books with strong romantic threads and the over-the-top covers helped me tap into my inner hedonist and the playful Eros energy that so easily got clogged in the uptight world of academia.

The Art of the HEA

So I finished graduate school. I got a full-time job—actually my DREAM job at my local community college. Then I started blogging, mostly in an attempt to figure out what happiness looked like for me now that I actually had the time and space to devote to crafting a more balanced life. I had a steady income in the city I wanted to put roots down in (Albuquerque—my hometown). I had time to write just for me. I could take better care of myself, emotionally, mentally, and physically.

I was so grateful to be back in a land where it was normal to be a brown person and cultural diversity was the norm. Plus weekends with actual free time became a thing for me, as were evenings that started around 5 instead of 9 or 10. So I blogged, exploring what happiness looked like for me. The blog became an award-winning book, a lifestyle and an ongoing self-care practice that helped me tap into the magic of everyday life. To be clear: these were all things I’d fantasized about for years and now they were coming true. Without being entirely conscious of it, I was already in the midst of building my own Happily Ever After (HEA).

It wasn’t until my Year of Radical Self-Care, in which I consciously and deeply explored how to best listen to my needs day-in and day-out, that I discovered the joys of the modern romance novel. I’d been designing a course for my local university’s Honors College on romance in popular culture and felt I couldn’t possibly address that topic thoroughly without looking at the romance novel. I’d read a lot about it. I had a whole history of courtship novels to inform me. I picked up books here and there and continued to read romance-adjacent stories. But each time I tried to dive into the genre, I got completely overwhelmed by options. I was sure there was a lot of good stuff out there, along with the bad and just so-so, but I just didn’t know where to look. So designing that course became a way for me to finally and properly explore the world of the modern romance novel.

That’s when I found Smart Bitches, Trashy Books and I haven’t looked back since. It told me everything I needed to know, offering up a whole cornucopia of books in a variety of sub-genres with graded reviews. Remember all those romance-adjacent books I’d been reading? Turns out many of them were all pretty much plain old romances! Steampunk romances, paranormal romances, fantasy romances, romantic suspense, Gothic romances…I could go on but you get the idea.

Looking back, it’s no surprise that I finally drove into the world of romance novels during my year of radical self-care. They were soothing. They made me feel good. They lifted my spirits and helped me release stress. But most of all, they made me feel empowered. Reading books by women of color, especially, made me appreciate myself and my accomplishments more, as well as give me the confidence to continue developing an identity outside of my professional life.

I felt sexy, beautiful, bold and powerful—things I didn’t always feel at work when it seemed I had to curb my feminity to be taken seriously or be constantly angry to assert healthy boundaries (it should be no secret that minority women work twice as hard to prove themselves, compared to their white male counterparts). But romance novels taught me that I didn’t just have to be about the struggle. That I was allowed to have joy.

Now this blog is getting way longer than I intended and it has taken me much longer to write because, once I started, I found that I had a lot to say (a whole book’s worth it sometimes feels!). So I’ll start wrapping things up by saying this: I realized that my journey in reading and writing about courtship novels, blogging about everyday magic, and immerse myself in the romance genre, have all been because I was struggling to find narratives in which people of color and othered bodies are allowed to find happiness, joy, and pleasure. That those things were nothing to be guilty or ashamed about (trust me—when you reach a certain level of success, it is easy to start feeling like you have to apologize for it). In these books I began to discover that happiness wasn’t in limited supply and pleasure wasn’t something that could only be enjoyed in small, furtive sips.

Speaking of sips, I think it’s high time I get around to the whole reason I started writing this blog: The Bodice Ripper Cocktail. This of this as my tribute to all that is sacred and delicious in the pleasure of a good trashy novel. And, yes, not all romances are created equal. There are plenty of narratives that reinforce white ableist patriarchy or outdated sex and gender norms. But on the whole, I think the genre from the 18th century to now, is inherently social-justice based. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t trial and error as we explore healthier narratives, moments in which it feeds back into the patriarchy it is trying to subvert, or the fact that we have to grapple with the historical moments in which a book is produced.

Take the old school bodice ripper, after which this cocktail is named. There’s plenty of non-consensual stuff happening between the pages of those books. But, in a world in which women didn’t yet have sexual identities independent from the male gaze in the eyes of mainstream society and the fear of the autonomous female body was centuries old, it makes a certain sense that these issues would be explored within the “safe framework” of male control. Like the courtship novel of the 18th century that had to end in marriage, the bodice ripper fo the mid-20th century had to include aggressive male-driven sexual action in order to exist safely within the framework it was trying to subvert. It doesn’t mean that those narratives are okay, just that they represent the early stages of a genre trying (and not always succeeding at) changing the way we think about gender, sex, agency, and HEAs. Heady stuff, huh?

Still, the Bodice Ripper and all that came before and after it is worthy of celebration. If you want to begin your own journey into the realm of the romance novel, check out some of the books in photo below and indulge in some of these fantastic podcasts, in addition to Smart Bitche Trashy Books, that wonderfully frame the genre, its issues, its joys, and the wonderful range of books you can explore within it: Heaving Bosoms Podcast, Shelflove Podcast, RomBkPod, and Book Riot’s When in Romance. You can also check out my HEAs All Day book club if you want to learn even more about romance novels as social justice narratives.

The Cocktail Recipe

Okay, so I know it is a tall order to make one drink to encompass all that is romance since the genre is so wide and eclectic. We’ve got the sweet and cozy romances, reminiscent of a cup of hot cocoa, the sleek and modern martini variety, and the NSFW kind, akin to all those sugary drinks with dirty names, and anything and everything in between.

For the purposes of this cocktail, however, I decided to honor the spirit of the bodice ripper and all those trashy book covers I’ve coveted for all these years. I wanted my drink to be one part liquid courage, one part wanton abandon, with a dash of heat (or more if you are so inclined!). I needed to be bracing and a little sweet. And yeah, there should be cherries involved, if we’re sticking to the Old School variety of these novels, wink wink.

My drink is a riff on the sidecar. I swapped the brandy for Effen cherry liquor, which lends a lush vanilla cherry base. To keep the drink from being cloying, I used a citrus-peel forward orange liquor (see link below) and lemons juice. The plot twist is a few dashes of chili pepper bitters because you can’t have a bodice ripper without some heat! If you don’t have cherry vodka or just want to be like the modern romance novel and abandon the cherry-focal point, regular vodka will do.

This drink embodies the spirit of a genre that has inspired me to be fearless in my acceptance of pleasure and to open myself to the deliciousness of life. You’ll also notice that the books in the image positively OVERWHELM the drink. That’s because I was trying to make things, well, overwhelmingly bodice-ripper-y or perhaps heaving-bosom-y. In other words, for you romance novices, I wanted to show how the books overwhelmed the drink, much in the same way the emotions and sexuality overpower the people in these stories enough to rip a bodice or two…or, better put, cause a heroine to burst out of hers. If this sort of logic doesn’t make sense, drink this cocktail and read it again. All will become clear.

Oh, and if you saw Pride & Prejudice in my photo and don’t understand why I would consider it a bodice ripper than you’re reading it wrong. Again, drink this cocktail and revisit this classic courtship novel. All will become clear.

Ingredients:

2 oz Effen cherry vodka

3/4 oz freshly squeezed lemon juice

3/4 oz orange liquor, preferably one with an orange peel-forward flavor

2-10 drops smoked chili bitters depending on how HOT you want it!

ice

optional lemon peel or cherry for garnish

Combine ingredients in a shaker and shake vigorously for a minute. Pour into martini glass. Serves one, so double the recipe and invite your personal Fabio over. Pairs well with steamy reads, long walks on the beach, and insta-love.

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Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!

Reading Holiday Ghost Stories...with a Christmas Spirit Chaser

Okay, okay, so November is usually the month I celebrate the sacred simple pleasure of reading and all-around cozy living with food and drink pairings to accompany of few hours spent with books….but then the month got away from me, so this year’s musings are a teensy bit later than usual. But that’s what happens when you’re enjoying life and readings so many wonderful books!

I might be a month late on this post, but the contents are in perfect accord with the spirit of the season! This year, I’m writing about ghost stories and scary tales that help us face our fears and confront the dark side of humanity. Why? We can’t have light without facing the darkness. That’s the price of magic.

The Tradition of Reading Ghost Stories at Christmas

Last year, I read about the old tradition of tellings ghost stories on Christmas Eve and, in fact, all Christmas season. I love the idea, especially since my heart always longs for the chills and thrills that only seem acceptable to celebrate during Halloween season, which, in all honesty, I try to stretch out as long as possible. You’ve heard of Christmas in July? Well, for me, Gothic season is September through November. Now, thanks to learning about this old storytelling tradition, I can celebrate all things spooky through December too.

To me, the nights of Autumn Equinox that then ripen into the Winter Solstice are prime times to sink into the magic and catharsis of the darker side of life. Seriously, is there anything cozier than immersing yourself in a spooky story on a cold, dark night with only the firelight to keep you warm and hold the darkness at bay? Be still my pagan heart! And yeah, full disclosure, I also spend a good part of spring and summer reading spooky stories because that’s just who I am. Give me a good summer monsoon with thunder and lightning to read Gothic romances by and I am a happy woman. All the same, there’s still something deliciously cozy about reading supernatural tales in the heart of winter.

Ghost Stories to Read by Firelight—& Twinkle Lights

When the semester is done and my home is bursting with twinkle lights and a festive tree that can only be described as “Christmas explosion,” I enjoy taking an afternoon to read by twinkle lights or firelight—or both! I put on a pot of tea, snuggle under one of my knit blankets on the couch, and sink into the healing power of stories.

Prior to learning about the Christmas tradition of reading ghost stories, I’d come to save my subscription of Occult Detective Quarterly for a quiet winter’s day when I could enjoy the variety of chills and thrills it always offers. There’s nothing like a good ghost story—unless you throw in a good paranormal investigator to guide you through the realm of the unknown. In the same vein, I cannot wait to dive into Ghostly Clients and Demonic Culprits: The Roots of Occult Detective Fiction.

If you’re wanting a more traditional read such as Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, try The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories or, if you aren’t particular about Christmas- supernatural tales, Ghostly Tales: Spine-Chilling Stories of the Victorian Age. They are both fantastic collections of some of the most iconic ghost stories and Gothic writers. There are too many ghost story anthologies that I love to name them all, so check out my teaser photo below of the Christmas Spirit for a few more book recommendations.

As much as I love reading, sometimes, after a long term of grading papers, my eyes hurt and I literally can’t take in the written word. That’s why I am so completely grateful for audiobooks and podcasts. My current spooky favorite is On a Dark, Cold Night, a podcast that features the original work, both in writing and music, of Kristen Zaza. It’s eerily beautiful! Want something a little over-the-top? Try Relic Radio’s The Horror, a podcast dedicated to old-time radio performances of classic scary stories. Both are perfect for a quiet night at home or a laid back holiday crafting day.

The Christmas Spirit…Cocktail

So you’ve got your stash of scary stories. You’ve got your twinkle lights and a crackling fire. You have a knit blanket and a cozy spot to tuck into. You might even have the perfect pair of pajamas to dawn and a black cat familiar to snuggle close for when your story gets a little too scary…okay, maybe that last part is about me. I do love a good ghost story, but I am also easily scared. What can I say? I’m a conundrum. A conundrum with a black cat to hold my hand through the darker parts of a story, luckily. In fact, the only thing that would make this scene anymore perfect would be a holiday drink to console, comfort, and fortify as you turn the next page. So what’s a bruja to do?

Last year, I wrote about one of my absolute favorite genres, all things Occult Detective, and whipped up a cocktail for it. Let’s face it, monster hunters are less tea and sympathy and cakes and more fire and brimstone with a whiskey back. This season of ghosts stories seems equally in need of a fortifying drink. I knew it needed to be something that conjured the warmth of the fireside with the enjoyable chills and thrills of a well-told Gothic tale. The plan was to call it The Ghost Story, but it didn’t quite evoke the comfort and warmth of telling supernatural stories during the holidays, something altogether more comforting and soothing, I’m finding, than the reading them during Halloween season. No, what we needed was a little festive flare.

Enter The Christmas Spirit. Yeah, I went there! And let me tell you, this drink tops anything Hallmark can do. It’s all the pagan festivity without the saccharine overdose of CHRISTmas. It’s warming, spicy, with a little kick at the end that makes us appreciate the twists and turns of a well-told tale. I used an orange liquor (see below) that was orange-peel forward, so as to get the pop of bright holiday flavor, minus overly-sweet taste of more traditional orange flavoring. I added some cherry bitters to round out the sense of a cozy winter’s evening at home, and conjure the pleasure of rich Christmas ‘s fruity flavors. Then the dash of smoked chili bitters to evoke the sharp catharsis of a dark story’s end. Add ice and you’ve got the makings of a perfect ghost-story chaser. All you need is bourbon to round things out. It’s enough to warm your heart, comfort your soul, and brace you for the inevitable spine-tingling goodness that is a good ghost story.

If a glass of courage isn’t your cup of tea, then consider trying…well…a cup of tea. Try the smokey lapsang souchong (my perennial favorite) for an afternoon of reading or a cup of mint chocolate rooibos for a mellow evening’s storytelling—both of which can be found at NM Tea Co. And if you need a little something more to get you through that next page, read on for how to make The Christmas Spirit.

Ingredients:

2 oz. bourbon

.75 oz orange liquor, preferably one with an orange peel-forward flavor

5 drops cherry bitters

1-2 drops smoked chili bitters

ice

maraschino cherry and orange peel for garnish (optional)

Directions:

Combine all liquid ingredients in a tumbler glass and stir. Add ice and stir again. Garish with cherry and orange peel. Makes one, so whip up a few more: one for someone to cuddle with as you read your stories and another for any friendly spectral visitors who happen by (the unfriendly ones can just move along). Enjoy!

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Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you. If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is in the everyday, subscribe to my newsletter below for regular doses of enchantment. Want even more inspiration? Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Here’s to a magical life!