A young pagan friend of mine recently asked, "How do you know when you're educated or strong enough in the Craft to write you own spells successfully?" She'd worked some magick for a friend of hers and hadn't seen any results.
I've always been of the belief that you are innately ready to work magick - at least the simple charms and spells that most of us will use in our daily lives. There are schools of magick that are much more complicated and involved that require extensive study, but few of us will ever tread down those paths.
Most of us still cross our fingers for luck. We toss salt over our shoulder when we spill it or make sure we knock three times (not more, not less) when we knock on wood. Sure, you could say these are superstitions, but they are also spells in their simplest form.
We also do more complex spellwork in the regular course of our lives. One example would be the tradition of making a wish and blowing out the candles on our birthday cake. While it may seem simplistic and mundane due to its commonplace nature, this simple act is steeped in sympathetic magick. On the day of our birth we blow out a specified number of candles (one for each year of our life) in order to have a wish granted.
If magick and spellwork is so simple, why don't we always see results?
I'm a firm believer that we go through our challenges in life for a reason. I believe that there are no empty moments, that we can learn from any experience. My own life is a good example of that. In the midst of a challenging medical condition, I'm learning a great deal about my internal processes, my ability to deal with stress, even my own belief system.
Now let's say I worked a spell to end the medical crisis and it didn't work. Would it mean that the spell was a failure? Not necessarily. Perhaps something stronger was in play. If I worked the spell and it cured my condition, it's safe to argue that the lessons I would have learned would have to be picked up somewhere else. And would that process be even more challenging than the one I'm going through?
When we talk about ritual and spellwork, we refer to a certain amount of energy being tied to an intent and released into the world to influence an outcome. It only makes sense that the outcome could also be perceived as energy. For instance, my medical condition is at the root of all I do and is a major theme in my personal and spiritual growth. What many would perceive as a negative experience, I'm using to my benefit. If a well-meaning friend could cast a spell and heal me before I was ready to go through the process myself, I would be deprived of the lessons I have yet to learn. The energy I am putting into learning from life's challenge is certainly greater than any spell - and therefore might be stronger than a spell my friend would work on my behalf.
Another way to look at this is to ask ourselves, could we change a wolf's carnivorous nature through a spell? No. It's a characteristic that is innate to their path. Could we forever stop the rain from falling on a coastal town? No. The cycle of precipitation is an innate part of the weather's journey.
Think of spellwork, not as a solution, but as a component of the outcome. If we could simply change an outcome through spellwork alone, every witch would win the lottery, be slender and beautiful, and incredibly famous. Magick simply doesn't work that way. What it can do is lend strength, open doors, and augment and enhance our own efforts.
To answer the question, "How do you know when you're educated or strong enough in the Craft to write you own spells successfully?" it's not a matter of whether the spells are successful or not, but rather how do we measure that success. Can we lessen our struggles? Open doors to new opportunities? Can we find strength when we were feeling weak? Then that spell is a success.