spiritual tools

Tools you make yourself can be more powerful because they have your own
unique energies. If you find materials nearby or in special places you have
bonded with, even better! This combines your own personal inspiration, as
well as the place where you live. Like eating from your own garden might
help tune you tune-in to the land upon which you live... Likewise for
gathering a branch for a wand or a knife handle, a stone -- whatever you use --
from the special places that you know, and that know you.
A home-made tool is like a home-cooked meal versus a restaurant. Both
meals are yummy, but which might be better for a magickal purpose? Canned
chicken soup for a healing spell?
Magick (like many parts of nature) is often "coin operated" -- meaning you
have to put something into a process to get results. The time you take to
plan your tool, gather its materials, construct it, tinker with it,
manipulate it in your hand as you shape it -- all these things adds more energy
than just clicking on an eBay link.
That being said, you can't make everything from scratch. Making an athame
or sword for most people would be difficult. You can buy and assemble
blade parts, but you probably won't forge the metal. So the level of
"home-made" will vary from person to person.
I bought my athame, then modified it as needed. (Even the best
home-cooked meals do not include churning your own butter or raising your own
livestock.)
Tools handed down by your elders might feel special too. While very few
people have parents or grandparents who were active in the Craft, imagine
having an heirloom from your blood-family or your Craft-family... In his
book "Witchcraft Today" Gerald Gardner said "Old tools are always preferred, as
they are supposed to have Power. If you cannot get these, you are told to
attempt to make your own, and I have seen some very clever work." I have
a WHK that I consider an heirloom. Others, I made from scratch or modified
myself.
Blessings,
Link
Miami Beach