This past week, a troubled man walked into a party and made a beeline for my friend Eron Vito Mazza, author of The Living Lenormand and host of the podcast The Witching Hour with Eron Mazza.
“You’re the conjurer of demons!” he said. “You didn’t happen to put a curse on me, did you?”
He was dead serious. There was apparently no time to say hello.
I don’t believe anyone cursed this man—but I have little doubt that he has cursed himself. When Mazza lived with us, I learned a few things about witchcraft, chief among them the power of intention.
For more than a year, this man has been consumed by the need to avenge a routine breakup. That fixation has spiraled into evictions, a felony assault, jail time, a psychiatric hold, financial ruin, and public humiliation—every consequence blamed squarely on his ex and anyone he believes aligned with them.
Across many spiritual traditions runs a shared warning: harm sent outward does not travel alone—it returns to the sender. In Wicca, this is often expressed through the Threefold Law or the principle of energetic return, which holds that whatever energy a practitioner projects—blessing or curse—comes back magnified. A curse is not a one-way weapon but a closed loop. By focusing intent on malice, the practitioner immerses themselves in the very vibration they wish upon another, binding their own spirit to anger, fear, and obsession.
Beyond witchcraft, similar teachings appear worldwide. In Buddhism, harmful intention generates negative karma that shapes future suffering. Hindu philosophy teaches that actions rooted in ill will further entangle the soul in samsara. Christian scripture cautions that “as you sow, so shall you reap,” while warning that judgment rebounds upon the judge. In Islam, injustice is understood as a spiritual burden that ultimately weighs upon the perpetrator’s soul. Different languages, same mechanism: intention carries consequence.
Psychologically and socially, the principle is just as evident. Cursing others fosters rumination, reinforces hostility, and narrows perception. The mind rehearses the grievance again and again, strengthening stress responses and corroding empathy. Over time, this inward erosion manifests as anxiety, bitterness, and isolation—self-inflicted wounds born of sustained ill intent.
The ancient warning, then, is less mystical than it appears. To curse another is to practice becoming someone who lives in a cursed inner world. To choose restraint, protection, or blessing is to cultivate clarity and resilience. Across magic and religion alike, the lesson endures: what you send into the world shapes the world you must live in—beginning within yourself.
I’ve come to understand this not only through study, but through lived experience.
One of the great dangers of revenge is how difficult it becomes to exit the cycle. You’re spiraling downward, yet in the dizzying chaos you convince yourself that stepping off means your enemy wins.
In this man’s case, he is so lost he no longer believes he has the power to stop. Instead, he insists that all his suffering is the product of a vast conspiracy orchestrated by his ex—an imagined web that somehow includes universities, public figures, corporations, and even City Hall. He’s punching a wall while believing the wall is punching back.
For those who don’t gamble, it seems baffling that someone would wager their rent money—or money that isn’t even theirs. But consider this: the loss is only real when you walk away. As long as you stay at the table or the machine, there’s the deluded hope of winning it all back and more, even as the hole grows deeper.
That is where our subject now stands—convinced that vindication waits at the bottom of the pit he is digging. Each shovel of dirt is meant to bury his enemies, even as he digs his own grave.
It feels like an impossible situation with a potentially frightening ending. Between this, the persistent squatter next door, and national politics, it feels like 2025 was a year of intractable stubbornness. Let’s set an intention for something better.