What’s a spell?

Different traditions seem to define spells in different ways.

I work with one coven where people think of spells in a very traditional way – an odd number of people stand under the full moon at midnight, around an altar with one candle of one particular color and two candles of another particular color, each anointed with a particular oil and incised with particular symbols, placed in a particular way. Each person holds a particular thing in their right hand and another particular thing in their left, and together they chant a particular chant some particular number of times, and in principle it all goes wrong if any one of those is not just so.

I have a different view. To me, a spell is a prayer with an action – whatever you do to spell out your desires to the Universe. One that I use a lot is for holding a traffic light green. I imagine a gigantic broom sweeping me through the intersection, and fairly often I’ll make a sweeping sound. It doesn’t always work, but it usually does; and that aligns with my intent: I don’t want to get through the intersection at the expense of someone who has a more urgent need.

Is that a spell? I don’t know, but it works; and that’s what I care about.