The Vampyre Witch Performs the Opening Ceremony of  The Dark Alliance Ball on October 27, 2023.

Well y’all… I did it. I built an ancestor altar and led the opening ceremony for Dark Gift ALLIANCE Covenstead. I was terrified. But I did it.

“Everything I want is on the other side of fear” had been my mantra for weeks leading up to my trip down to NOLA. I had never led a full group ritual in person before. Only online in zoom settings prior to this. I went from 0 to 1000 going from no experience to opening ritual at a NOLA Vampyre Ball. It was one of those offers that I couldn’t say no to but I knew I was not quite ready for.

So honestly I was mortified. I’m sure the stress was radiating off of me leading up to it. My body was physically trembling. I was in a full on state of panic. To be fair, I was in that full panic state for hours prior… and not only that, I have gotten engaged 2 hours prior. So I was already panicking, got engaged to mid panic, continued to panic leading up to the event, panicked in the minutes before the event. I was *stressed*. “Everything I want is on the other side of fear”. Just keep telling myself it’ll be okay. I got this. I’m gonna get through it. I have my family and fiance rallied around me. This will be good practice. The doom is major but the experience will be worth it.

Once we arrived to the venue, I got to setting up the ancestor altar right away.

I somehow managed to forget *so many things* so I didn’t have a lot of the materials I needed to set the ritual up. Fun. I forgot the cauldron to burn loose herbs, forgot an herb wand for other herb burning. Forgot any kind of incense. I was crushing it on the materials end (not) So that was cool.Luckily I had enough to make the altar look good, some offerings, and the necessary ritual bits to make it all work. I got everything set up looking nice… and then began to *panic* again.

My sister wanted me to have a conversation with her daughter right before the ritual and I’m like I love you but noooooo. haha. Looking back on it I’m just like… why do I get so worked up over that kind of thing? I know it’s because I care. but lort I was stressed.

THEN I was convinced that my start time was 11:30, turns out it was 11:45. So I’m like… did I get skipped? That’d be cool. But no, I was just misinformed. WOMP. So I get called to do the ritual…

My heart could’ve came straight out of me at this point, but I slowly began to read my ritual and worked through it. It was too dark to read my book so I had to use one of my battery tea lights to read. I was physically wobbly as I walked around my circle for being in fight or flight for hours, but I did it… I chanted my words loudly. I didn’t look up from my book enough, but I gave the ritual everything I had regardless. The nerves could’ve gotten the best of me, but they didn’t, and I’m proud of myself for getting through it.

Regardless of all the things I could pick at myself for, I know now what to practice to make the next time better. I also recognize where I need more training before I take on more things like that.

Oh yea… and this fucking guy….  demon roomba 😂

He’s just wandering all around during the ritual and at some point ends up right in the path while I’m walking my circle. Just like “Doo do dooo” taking a leisurely glide through the ritual. So anyone who mentions I was attacked by a demon roomba during the ritual, that’s this guy. 😛 Nah I’m just kidding, it was funny. I was just like “oop” and walked around it but apparently it was more noticeable than I thought.

THEN! I somehow managed to not copy the last 2 pages of my ritual into my book properly? I’m closing out the ritual, turn the page, and the page is *blank* – I all but panic. Thank fuck I didn’t throw away the printer paper version of the ritual. I tried to write it in my grimoire for a better look but lort… Reasons why it’s good to be able to improvise ritual and not rely solely on a script. Which I’m terrible at and trying to work on getting better.

I’m very thankful to have been told by several people that they appreciated my ritual and the ancestor altar, especially Lestelle who booked me and that’s truly all I wanted. Lestelle even said she’d love to have me back again in the future. I couldn’t ask for a better outcome than that, truly.

I share this story with you because I’m glad I sucked it up and did the thing. We’re not all experts at everything and we all have to start somewhere in our journey towards becoming the strong witches (or anything) we want to be. We can be so strong in some areas but shy away from things we have less experience with out of shame for being a beginner. It’s hard to be vulnerable in a beginner’s seat in communities and subcultures that pride themselves on how much they know (and bully people for it) But I’ll be real with you, public ritual work is super not my expertise and I’m learning how to be that person on the fly. I know what to expect in these settings now. I figured out some of my strengths and what to practice to train my weak spots. I share my not so perfect journey through my first experience with public ritual in hopes that it inspires you to push past fear to take the next step towards something you want to do too. <3 and also… don’t let anomalies like demon roomba or forgetting the last 2 pages of your ritual ruin your experience. Take it in stride and find the humor in the hiccups. <3

Moral of the Story: Do the things you want to do but you’re scared to do so you can get past the awkward stage and evolve past it.