Hello everyone! I’d like to share an idea with you on tracking things about your Craft (or practice, or whatever you prefer to call it). Tracking can provide you with insights, help you form your understanding of magic, and a host of other benefits.
So, how are we tracking things? One way is to use a digital journal, which makes it very easy to search for terms and immediately get a list of when those things are mentioned. Tags on tumblr or other sites may work similarly. But what about those of us who prefer a more analog, hand-written approach?
My friends, I suggest to you…washi tape.
For any of you who don’t know, washi tape is a low-tack, decorative tape. Think really pretty, not very sticky painter’s tape. I mostly see it used in bullet journals and cardmaking, but can be applied to many crafts. It comes in just about any design and color scheme you can think of, and I should warn you now, it can be addictive. My fellow bullet journalers will know what I mean when I say you can never have too many washi tapes.
So then, how are we using washi tape to track our Craft in our analog journals? Associate each thing you’d like to track with a particular washi tape. I suggest making an index that tracks which washi tape is associated with what item. Then, for every time you mention a tracked item, place a piece of the associated washi tape on the edge of your journal, forming a tab on the edge of the page, visible when the book is closed (exactly how long this is will be your decision). Now you can immediately open to pages referencing what you are tracking, and you can visually see how often you mention it simply by seeing how often that washi tape repeats!
Eventually you may run out of a particular washi tape and can’t find a replacement, in which case you can replace it with a similar one. You may wish to include space for such secondary washi tapes in your index, or you can make a note in your journal at the first use of the new design.
What if you don’t own washi tape? No worries. Here are some other ideas on what to use:
- decorated or colored paper clips
- tabs made of paper, fabric, whatever you want (i.e a certain color or pattern of paper for each item you are tracking, or a specific fabric trim for each tracked item)
- stickers (will likely be inside the book instead of being a tab visible from the outside, better for use when skimming the book)
- highlighters (again for skimming, and very easy to replace so long as you are using common highlighters colors)
So then, what are we even tracking? That’s up to you. Here are some ideas:
- repeated symbols (i.e. those in dreams)
- spell ingredients
- spell intents
- tarot cards drawn
- offerings to/interactions with deities or spirits (could track either the type of interaction, the offering, or which spirit or deity you are working with, or a combination)
- anything else you can think of!
A note on tarot card tracking: to truly track your draws in a standard RWS deck, you’d need 78 washi tapes (or 156 if you count reversals separately). That is…a lot of washi tape. It may be more practical to track each suit and the major arcana, giving you only five needed washi tapes. To be a little more detailed, you could try a tracker for major arcana, the court cards of each suit, and the non-court cards of each suit, which would require only nine washi tapes.
What journal might this apply to? Anything, really. A tarot journal, a Book of Shadows, a journal for tracking your dreams, a shadow work journal, really anything where multiple topics appear. The idea can easily extend to the mundane as well!
I’m sure there are plenty of other versions of this one could come up with. I hope you have fun with this, and feel free to tag me on any of my social media if you post pictures or thoughts on this post and its implementation!
Science and Sigils 