In this article on Finding the Pagan Path, Alex J. Coyne writes about how music, culture, books and tarot influenced his spirituality when growing up in South Africa.Witchcraft and the Pagan path isn’t for everyone, but I imagine most practitioners have moments of revelation where they feel called closer to certain paths and people. In 2025, I realised my occult interests had finally come out in the open even though they had always been part of my life in some form or another in private. I realized I finally felt more comfortable with myself than before... and surprisingly, I offended less people being myself than I ever did trying to pretend my way through.
Here’s how I went from being born in the valley of the shadow of zef, to finally accepting myself thanks to the help of a few kind, thoughtful friends.
Born Zef
I was born several weeks prematurely, and raised in an average Christian, conservative Afrikaans-speaking household.
My parents went to church because it was “the right thing to do.” Their only rebellion was a switch from the conservative and Calvinist “Gereformeerde” (Reformed) congregation to the Dutch Reformed Church – and my paternal grandparents didn’t speak to them for years as a result.
I grew up on the East Rand, South Africa, which includes the notorious areas of Brakpan, Boksburg and Benoni... Or where “zef” is an accidental aeshetic instead of a deliberate choice.
Before the evolution of Watkin Tudor Jones and Die Antwoord, the music video for “Straight Outta Randburg” seems like it’s overdriven but somehow isn’t an entirely inaccurate picture of what you’d find. I remember the burger place. Conservative Afrikaans society practically had a fit w hen “Enter the Ninja” released.
“Baby’s on Fire” provoked a similar mainstream reaction. Average Christian, conservative Afrikaans-speaking households weren’t ready to admit that “zef” was a thing in their homes, or ready to see that their kids were embracing the occult and saying words like poes.
I grew up in a house with books, and thankfully, regular trips to the library. The house had plenty of books about classic art, poetry, psychology and religion, but somehow mixed in with volumes about the Satanic Panic and the occult unit sleuth “donker (dark) Jonker.”
Columnist Deon Maas wrote about (LaVeyan) Satanism in 2006, admitting that it had a right to be recognized as a formal religion. Immediately, conservatives organised a boycott and he was fired from the newspaper after national pressure.
Planetary Spells and Rituals
I discovered my path to occult study and witchcraft around 2010. At the time, it wasn’t yet an accepted choice – not in the household, or in the country. Aged about 16, I discovered a small esoteric store in the middle of a flea market.
It was right in the middle of zef-valley, and run by a quirky and sharp-tongued English witch who had grown up in England a Catholic, but came to Southern Africa with her family. She was as eccentric as I could hope to describe, but also knowledgeable about many occult topics.
I was allowed to ask anything I wanted to know, and could browse through various books about witchcraft and the occult. Every visit, she introduced me to one more crystal, one more herb, or one more nugget of mythology. My interest in occult topics existed long before this point, but only found a focused direction in that little esoteric store.
Stocking the store, a new batch of books arrived from Llewellyn’s catalogue. I picked up
Planetary Spells and Rituals: Practicing Light and Dark Magick Aligned with the Cosmic Bodies by Raven Digitalis. The cover is what got me first, though soon, I was instead making notes powered with
Planetary Spells and Rituals, Cunningham’s Book of Shadows and
Buckland’s Complete Book of Witchcraft.
Picking up Planetary Spells and Rituals might have been the singular, pivotal moment that changed my life and writing. Even though I didn’t bring my magickal practices out in the open until much later, an important lesson clicked: it’s okay to be yourself.
My parents divorced shortly after this, and I moved away from home at 19. I was still naive and chaotic, and made many of the mistakes that go along with being naive and chaotic. For a while, I thought I was going to be a professional guitarist – the plan quickly changed when my health did, and I instead turned to writing and journalism. I had almost always owned a closeby tarot deck, but only recently took the altar out of the proverbial closet past 30.
Remixing My Reality
Digitalis, Cunningham and Buckland had a profound influence on my starting path. I was honoured to interview Buckland for People Magazine (2016). Much later, I ecstatically joined Raven Digitalis as promotional assistant for A Gothic Witch’s Oracle (Digitalis/Santerineross) and The Empath’s Oracle (Digitalis/Bax).
Music found its way back into my daily rituals; I asked DJ Lil2Hood to be my occasional beta-reader, and embarked on a whole new journey as a better writer who didn’t feel as solitary anymore. While I was still a writer and journalist like before, though I had become more comfortable with myself – in print and in person.
My website suddenly looked different than five or seven years ago, and it was a true reflection of the metamorphosis: I had gone from being a quiet blogger to actively writing and publishing again. The homepage led to reviews of Michael Osiris Snuffin’s Baphomet, the Gothic Witch’s Oracle Deck and the Rainbow Moon Tarot.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, I didn’t sit down and decide I was going to hang pentagrams everywhere. It was a slow, gradual path to witchiness instead of a sudden choice – one day, while sending out emails to promote Raven’s oracle decks and listening to Flash on the playlist, I just realized I had naturally reached this point.
About the Author
Alex J. Coyne is an author, journalist, editor and occult and tarot consultant. He has written for an array of publications and websites with a radar calibrated for gothic, gonzo and the weird. (alexjcoyne.com)
Would you like to tell your story in another Finding the Pagan Path post? Please email me at badwitch1234@gmail.com
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