Walk Boldly into the New Year with this Road Opening Ritual

Now we are using this ritual for the beginning of the year, but you can do it anytime that you’re starting a new project. Anytime that you feel blocked or may be stagnating in life, be it creatively or emotionally. Road Opener rituals are best done before any spell that you are doing, to remove blocks and energies that may work against your spell manifesting. So say your spell is for new employment, you would be clearing away those blocks, and hindrances to employment and opening up doors to new opportunities.

Road Opener is the term that’s used a lot in the Hoodoo style magick, but obstacle removal magic is used in many different traditions, the Hoodoo tradition Road opener is the term most people are familiar with.

So we have a Road Opener bath which is about clearing away the obstacles of the past and then paving the way for new growth. Now this is perfect to be done in conjunction with a spell, layering your spell, especially if it’s something really big, new employment, a legal matter, even relationships. Basically you are layering your goal spell with helper spells, it’s not about just lighting one candle and going okay I’m done.

The idea behind this ritual is inspired by the hoodoo tradition, you have a lot of emphasis on feet, basically footprint or foot track magic or laying down of tricks (spells) on the ground, for the target to walk over them and activate that spell. Hoodoo uses lots of powders that go on the ground which is why there is also a lot of emphasis on floor washers and keeping the floor clean and keeping the threshold of the house the doorway clean so that new opportunities can come in. But also if someone has laid a trick on you, then you are washing that away, clearing that away and stopping those hindrances. This is a take on that idea, opening the road you are walking along, or wish to walk along, or a door you wish to open, you are walking through into a new stage. Walking along your current path, your feet may have collected lots of psychic dross from previous situations, so your feet and can possibly be the obstacle that needs to be removed.

I’m not talking about we actually cut off your feet that’s a little bit macabre, what I am saying is that we wash your feet in a ritual way. It’s not just get a bit of soap and wash our feet, this is a bath to ritually and magically clear away those obstacles and things that you have collected on your feet that are now a hindrance to you actually going forward and finding those new opportunities.

We are using this spell/ritual as a way to ring in the new year, but it can be done at any time, like I said, it is a perfect before spell spell.

Part One – Banishing
In a bowl of water, wash your feet, clip your toenails, as you give them a good scrub, removing dryness, dead skin and calluses. Visualise the dryness and dead skin are the obstacles in your life you are removing, think of the things that no longer serve you, it’s now dead weight and you are just cleaning that off revealing new clean skin for new opportunities. You are thinking that all of these obstacles are being removed, all of the things that are hindering you, are now being removed. You’re scrubbing them away.

Once you have scrubbed, you can use some Salt – great for exfoliating. Salt is good for removing negativity and evil influences. You can add lemon juice to the water, a little bit of lemon balm oil in the water and is known as the destroyer of the evil eye as well as bringing money and opportunities. Mint is lovely as not only does it make your feet smell nice, but it is also good for healing and money.

Once you have cleaned and scrubbed your feet you can then tip that water down into the sink, obviously if you’ve got little bits and pieces (herbs, lemon wedges) in the water, remove them so they don’t clog the sink. As the water goes down the sink, you will then visualize all your obstacles running down the sink gone down into a river then the sea, cleansed and dispersed.

Any bits and pieces that you have I would then wrap them up in a paper towel and you can bury them in the ground and then again they will be converted into compost by the earth.

Part two – Initialise
Drawing in the good energy the things that you want because you’ve removed those obstacles you’ve taken away something now you have to fill it with something. When banishing something you’re leaving a hole, if it is not filled with something else, the universe will fill it with the last thing that was there, which is why you need to place the energy you like in the space.

Now in this instance, we have removed the obstacle, now we want to place on your feet the energy and representations of that which we would like to draw into our lives.

In your new bath place the things that represent and draw the energy you wish to attract, programming the water. This is where you do some research, find out what herbs and symbols align with what you wish to bring into your life, finding all the things that are aligned with getting new employment, creativity or health. Maybe it’s financial freedom, think of things and herbs that would go very well with this, like putting keys into the water (sympathetic magic). The key is the opener of doors and represents the opening up of opportunities, if you wanted more money then I would put some money in the water, coins and notes. You can put some cinnamon in there now I would be really careful with cinnamon oil, just put one drop, maybe two in the water – not on your skin – because cinnamon oil is hot and it will burn, maybe use cinnamon quills, van van oil is universally accepted as a road opener and good luck. For love you can have rose petals, some rose water, you are only limited by your imagination. The most important thing I would say is that if you’re putting herbs and essential oils into water I would check first that what you’re putting in is not toxic, or the combination will not create a toxic mix. That you’re not allergic to anything you are putting in the water, you are putting your feet into the water so what goes on your skin will go into your body into your nervous system, digestive system so you need to be aware that you’re not allergic and that you’re not putting toxic items into the water so again, be careful, do some research before you start just willy-nilly putting things in and just be safe okay. Alright!

Part Three – Sealing
Now this is it’s not mandatory, well none of this is really mandatory but I thought it was kind of another nice thing to add, and for me it was like sealing in the process. I’ve cleaned my feet of blocks, of obstacles, I’ve brought in the new goodness and the last thing is sealing that up by putting a sigil on the bottom of my feet to symbolise that as I walk I am now walking into new opportunities, a new path, a new life.

I used food colouring, as it is better to put on your skin than a pen and the different colour magic correspondence can be incorporated. My example sigil was made up of various planetary symbols, mercury is about communication about swiftness of communication moving through moving through obstacles it is the communicator. Venus for love but it’s also good for sweetening people and getting people on your side, we Jupiter is about expanding opportunities, Mars is used for confidence and going after opportunities and just forging ahead with that lovely arrow. We have the Sun for being seen in a good light, and success, then lastly we have Pluto for changing perspectives changing the way you think about things.

So draw your sigil on your feet and off you go, walking into new opportunities, new happiness, new joy. Your obstacles have been removed and you walk boldly and freely into a new and happy life.

I hope you give this a go and let me know how you go.