A time to [heal].

I know I am not the first to say when I or someone I loved have/has been wronged, I expected retribution.

Even if it did not come from my hands but was enacted by some force of divine justice, I felt retaliation against perpetrators was required. It was law.

I remember being a little girl sitting in the den of my grandparents' home, and some movie, far too grown for my adolescent understanding, would always be playing on the big back TV. Be it Kasi Lemmon's Eve's Bayou, Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven (my grandfather, much like many men of the generation, was an avid western film fanatic), Frank Darabont's Shawshank Redemption, or one of my personal favorites, Alice Walker's The Color Purple.

I didn't realize it then, but these movies shaped an intrinsic belief in my young mind that the 'righteous' always come out on top, and the 'wicked' pay the price dearly. It may not come quickly, as was the case with Andy Dufresne of Shawshank, nor for Celie of The Color Purple, but it came, and it was viciously unforgiving. Satisfying, even.

However, one movie that genuinely rattled my cage, a phrase I have adopted from a dear loved one who uses it to speak about the intensity of discomfort something can evoke in the soul, was A Time to Kill by John Grisham.

My 8-year-old behind should NOT have been watching that— but if there is one thing childhood neglect can teach you, it is abject horror found in the very real world. For years, that movie haunted me as a reminder that while retribution may come— sometimes much can be lost in the interim or thereafter. So much so that you must ask if the ends justify the means.

If you have not seen A Time to Kill and plan to do so, trigger warning: it is grim.

Now, as a person who walks on the side of the light and the dark, you won't see me arguing against any actions of Mr. Hailey, as, to me, they were wholly justified. Did he "come out on top"? Technically, yes, but not without much litigation and at the hands of someone he did not trust initially. Much time and safety were sacrificed to win, so to speak. While the movie leaves the audience with a sense of justice being "served," it doesn't really expound on what is usually waiting for a black man who kills a Klan member or so much as complains about a murderous crime they have committed. Having been raised with elders who let me know how the real world operates, it both scared and angered me as a wee lil bit of a thing to think, "Could I be harmed for righting a wrong?" and, well, as a practitioner of both magic and spiritual ways of living, the answer I have been given many years later would be simple.

To my spirits and guiding divinities, that answer is a resounding "Yes."

To the old me, that was a swift kick in the chest. What in the entire hell do you mean, ‘yes’? Do you mean to tell me I and my loved ones are supposed to be the mule of the world and just sit there being kicked, prodded, assaulted, and, God forbid, killed? The Devil is a lie.

But it took me much time and a lot of patience to see what they actually meant.

Of course, now I see that The Dead and The Divine can see all that was, is, and ever shall be— across all decisions made and considered. That is 4th or 5th dimensional vision, or the ability to see things across time, all at once, and how those realities can interact with each other. So when they give any answer that we may not want to hear, especially regarding retribution as payment for wrongdoing, we can assume it’s for our own good.

Sidebar: That reminds me of Paul Atreides in Frank Herbert’s Dune, or what I like to call Space Jesus and the Alaskan Bull Worm. Space Jesus could see all possible outcomes of a decision through some divine ancestral sight he inherited from his grandmama nem and had to choose just the right one, or the show was over, and everyone perished to the forces of evil. Groovy.

So, in considering that, one can realize that while our rage feels soothed by the prospect of “The Payback™” (cue, James Brown), the ends that await could mean our jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

In fact, I have a not-so-funny anecdote about that—one my best friend gave me permission to share. She has a homegirl whose first instinct at even the slightest hint of disrespect is to turn to left-handed magic. This friend had a falling out with another friend who, oddly enough, stole her car, so naturally, she put a root on the car (which was still in her name). As a result, the now ex-friend got into an accident and abandoned the car on the side of the road. Feeling pleased with this successful act of retribution, she got the cursed car back. She won, right?

However, she soon had a new problem, she, too, started getting into car accidents. And not just once, but repeatedly. It never occurred to her that in seeking her "get back" against her ex-friend, she had inadvertently cursed her own property in a fit of retaliation. After multiple breakdowns and roadside accidents, she eventually had to get a new car, only to continue getting into accidents to this day. Why? Because she put a curse on something that belonged to her. She cursed herself. The ex-friend got a good scare out of the ordeal but otherwise got off scot-free.

I've heard countless stories of this person’s revenge schemes backfiring in similar ways. In the case of the car, she could have used a particularly forceful domination working to compel the ex-friend to return it if she did not want to get cops involved but I suppose the catharsis of retaliation felt a tad sweeter.

Now, I am not saying the ancestors or divinities are pacifists. Not at all; just about every time they have told me to ‘sit this one out’, it is because they have a handle on it, and anything I could do, they can do much better. When that happens, I make my peace mentally and move on; believe me, it is a conscious decision every time. They’re playing quantum-level chess with our lives, and we use rocks to play checkers on a board carved in the dirt. I am saying that sometimes, they tell us to let it go because it isn’t worth what can be lost in the long run. Remember what I said about Space Jesus!

“You don’t have to like it; you may not even agree, but you will listen.” —the ancestral forces, probably.

They do not want us mentally bound or spiritually enslaved by something that is causing us pain. It’s also about having control over your own mind, and self. You need only to make sure you have done what they asked so that any blowback or ‘judgment’ for the situation in question does not fall on you. Contrary to popular memes online, burning the bridge while you stand on it really only works when you have nothing, and I mean, absolutely nothing to lose, and you are fully prepared to meet your maker if it comes down to it. Few people experience that kind of desperation, and it’s nothing to joke about. Revenge or seeking to up the ante in terms of meeting evil with more evil only serves to increase the level of wickedness one is willing to subject oneself to. It is an act that prohibits forward progression, as it is a being whose head is permanently twisted backward (yikes, what a mental image) to be assured that the person they left behind received their comeuppance, sufficiently, that is. Sometimes, that punishment takes a long, long, LONG while to find its owner, and waiting to witness it seems like a punishment within itself, no?

By the way, I am not referencing “3-fold law”— I don’t subscribe to that belief. I am not a Wiccan, nor a Neo-Pagan. I’ve seen plenty of tried and true ATR/ADTR practitioners do some absolutely grisly left-handed work, and not so much as a scratch came back on them after doing so. But in those instances, the work had all ‘t’s crossed and ‘i’s dotted by way of: (1) It was justified, (2) confirmed via divination, (3) the method of work was prescribed by the forces that stood in aid for said work, and in some cases, (4) they were also (including the first 3 rules) hired to do it. Big differences to note there.

Anywho.

So as to say, seeking retribution for every slight— barring extreme circumstances, keeps you bound to the past, unable to progress. It’s like a leash that binds your spirit to a specific point in time, kind of like debt. One feels something is owed to rectify the situation, and if it is not paid in the way and amount that they deem adequate, they cannot move forward. Except, they pay the interest in accruing anger, stress, and despair. Don’t even get me started on the fact that prolonged stress creates disease in the body. And I get it, in a world that constantly disempowers us, when we feel we have the methods to clip their wings in the same way they have done us, many of us may feel it is only fair. But, a code of conduct I learned from an old-timer a long time ago that in serious left-handed works, the following rules apply:

• Evil cannot be guided; it is only unleashed. It does not answer to anyone, nor is it loyal. It will always strike the weakest point. There is no such thing as a ‘little evil’ if you intend to use it; you must accept all that comes with it. This is why many ATRs tell parents to spiritually clean their children FIRST before themselves because all that leaves the parents goes to the child. Malevolent magic/forces do not care.

• You cannot produce good while producing evil; both must be respected as individual processes. Those forces do not mix. They have their own jurisdictions. The effort to cleanse and restore after an act of evil, makes it a long and arduous task.

• Nothing is allowed in so as to form a barricade. Some methods or tools of spiritual cleaning/protection wipe out EVERYTHING, both good and bad. And it stays that way until the work is over.

• Retribution work or retaliation should ideally be reserved for times when your or your loved ones’ lives are threatened, or, when someone has committed irreconcilable harm, but in my opinion, seek divination when this kind of work is considered.

• You don’t know what kind of spirits that person has doing their bidding or encouraging them to behave that way, so know who and what you’re dealing with first. People you perceive as malicious can still be formidable forces magically. Not every person with spiritual gifts is a decent person; don’t be fooled by that line of thinking.

Like the young woman in the anecdote I shared above, there is always more to be seen after that act of revenge, spiritually speaking, is delivered. Who’s to say her ancestors even wanted her to do what she’d done? My money would be on ‘no,’ but hindsight informed that bet (and the sheer ludicrousness of hexing a car that she wanted back in her possession, but that is neither here nor there). More trouble may be around the corner if all angles have not been considered beforehand. Like Mr.Hailey, we all got the feel-good moment of his vindication, but that movie was just that— a movie. Real life tells a different story of what end he might have met when everyone left the courthouse.

There is more that can be done instead of turning to magical acts of revenge. There are defensive works that achieve similar results and keep us out of harm’s way. For example, I personally always try to stop and take a look at a situation to see what the real intent is behind someone’s desire for retaliation. Let’s look at a few scenarios:

• Do they want revenge because someone stole something, or do they simply want the money/item back? (they also want to punish them for the audacity, but eh…leave it) Practical Solution: Do domination works to get them to return it, or if divination says that money/item is long gone, do prosperity work to bring more money than was lost via other pathways. The person who stole will get far more than they bargained for; believe me, I speak from personal experience, lol.

• Do they want revenge because someone hurt them emotionally, or do they want an apology and the other party to see the error of their ways? Practical Solution: Do remorse works to allow the other party the space to see what they have done wrong, and the guilt will do the rest. Hell, leave them to stew in it. Move on.

• Do they want revenge because someone spoke ill of them or gave them a hard time, or do they want the other party to just leave them alone? First, they must clean spiritually for any incurred intentional/unintentional juju. Do tranquilizing works to tranquilize their mouths, words, and the will to commit any harmful action. Also, ‘cool down’ a heated situation and/or drain that person of the energy needed to be hateful/weird. I’ve seen these works actually remove the person in question via non-violent pathways. (Ex. A rude coworker finds a different job elsewhere and leaves.) Sidenote, gotta be careful with work that “drains,” however, as it can be overdone and be made a “turnin’ work,” which then makes it baneful.

These are only a few ways to transmute the need for retribution into something practical and avoid allowing that anger to consume you. It’s easy in a world like ours to be angered by everything; knowing when and how to react is like using an exceptionally sharp blade; you have to be precise, or you could cut yourself.

I remember a conversation I had a long time ago with an old-timer about the art of keeping a cool head. They remarked that I shouldn’t dye my hair red anymore. Naturally, I was indignant—what of it? Having been criticized for my eccentric style since childhood, I could feel my blood pressure rising.

“Be cool, mama,” they chuckled. “It’s a color of passion, of rage. You should avoid rage. You shouldn’t wear red or black as much as you do—though it does look nice on you.” They sat there, looking ahead, amusement sunk into the wrinkles of their face. It was a beautiful spring day, there was calm rustling in the leaves of the trees that shaded the porch where we sat.

I was deflated. They could see right through me. Especially since, earlier that week—the same night I dyed it—I’d had a dream. In it, a mess of old hands held me underwater, forcefully washing the color from my hair.

“That’s just my style. I love the color.” I did. Dark red was, and still is, one of my favorites.

“That’s how I know your anger is somethin’ else. Though you try not to show it, your peoples are showin’ me. I can see that.”

When I was growing up, I was made to bottle the feelings of anger, the kind created from disrespect. So as a newly minted adult, I pushed back. I wasn’t interested in being cool about shit. If you wronged me, despite my efforts to always do right by people, you were going to have to see me. But they were right, and I was ill-prepared for this impromptu read from my ancestors through them.

“I try my best.” I wanted to defend whatever it was my folks were saying, but I didn’t have the words. What I did have was rage. They were right about that. I wasn’t quick-tempered by any stretch, but when the last straw finally broke the camel’s back, my anger was something else.

“Give that up. Heal it. Anger only seeks to kill you. Fast or slow—it’ll do it.”

Easy for them to say, I thought. Older folks swear they have all the answers. Give that up. Heal it. Just like that huh? ‘I’m cured,’ I wish I could have said, but I was raised with manners.

“Not everything is worth a response,” they continued.

That afternoon, I received more mediumship advice—words I still try to live by to this day.

“Sometimes, when you’re faced with decisions; when something tempts you to act in ways unnatural to your path, your values, your true spirit…when you feel pulled down to that level… that right there is the power and persuasion of negative spirits at work. You must then decide: will you allow them to keep whispering their will into your ear? Give that up. Don’t give them an inch.”

I don’t know about you, but that spooked the ever-living shit out of me when I first considered the implications. That day, I finally understood the meaning of “The Devil is a lie!” Because hell naw, you not about to coax me out of character so I can be Donkey of the Day or, God forbid, a cautionary tale of when “Keeping it real goes wrong.” No ma’am, no ham, no turkey! I will not be apart of a game designed to see who will lose more.

My usual caveat: Of course, sometimes your ancestors do want you to complete a work against the perpetrator in question, and that’s between you and them, and also not what I’m talking about. What I’m talking about is the intrinsic need for bad things to never go unpunished, sans advice from the divine forces. And why they might actually be against retaliative works in certain circumstances— something worse may be around the corner, waiting for you to knock over that first domino to really get the hellish party started.

This is how those older practitioners maintain a cool temper. Giving that need for vengeance up to the forces. Knowing when and how to react delivers precision and removes guessing games.

It’s freedom, in a way. Despite, at times, feeling much like bondage.

It is frustrating, sure, but sometimes it’s literally to keep us moving forward so we won’t be led off the path or bound to the past. And if all else fails to calm you, cry! Cry to your ancestors, vent, lose it - go for broke and tell on them folk who did you bad. Your tears and earnest feelings about the thing could move things brute strength cannot. You may not see the outcome, but I’ll tell you what my folks told me sometimes: “Their consequence is of no importance to your growth.”

Proceed in life and leave that mess behind.

Y’all be blessed,

-Lolu