tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75470435416346528982024-02-20T02:56:39.830-08:00American WarlockThe life lessons of a single father practicing magic from a uniquely New World perspectiveWadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.comBlogger21125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-59587066282651700502013-03-25T03:31:00.000-07:002013-03-25T03:31:25.111-07:00Are You a Real Magician?It’s late. Really late. Tonight was a pretty good night, and you’re driving home in the dark in a great mood. Nobody else on the streets. Favorite song on the radio. Life is good. Suddenly you see a little way up the road, the only flaw in your perfect evening – a red traffic light. It’s as if the gods saw your awesomeness and conspired to bring you down a peg. Well, to hell with that!<br />
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Slowing to a crawl, you raise your hand and direct your will at the offending traffic light, <a href="http://www.psychic-experiences.com/real-psychic-story.php?story=317" target="_blank">mentally commanding it to change to green</a> and allow you through (if you’re feeling extra saucy, maybe you’re pointing at the other green light, ordering it to turn yellow because that’s how it starts). Because, after all, it’s your True Will to get home, right? You have the right to absolutely <a href="http://hermetic.com/crowley/libers/lib77.html" target="_blank" title="Liber OZ">DESTROY that street light</a> if it thwarts you!<br />
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And oh yeah, that light gets the message. The opposite green obediently turns yellow, then red, and a moment later your light turns green and your foot hits the floor to launch your car homeward once more. Magic <em>so</em> kicks ass, doesn’t it?<br />
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<a href="http://wadelong.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/raistlin.jpg"><img alt="Super Badass, yo" class=" wp-image-289" height="300" src="http://wadelong.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/raistlin.jpg?w=235&h=300" width="235" /></a><br />
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This is Probably Not You</div>
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Not so fast there, Perdurabo. What just happened may not have been magic at all. Traffic lights are typically controlled by an inductance loop in the roadway that tells it when a car is waiting, so it’ll usually change for you if there are no cars coming the other way (and are you really trying to pull out in front of traffic anyway?). The ones that aren’t controlled by inductance loops are on relatively short timers (between 15 and 30 seconds in the U.S.). Did you really do magic at all? What just happened is a fundamental part of human mental development – your brain performed a process called <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_recognition_%28psychology%29" target="_blank" title="kidding yourself.">Pattern Recognition</a>. The human brain has an extremely difficult time processing chaotic input, and strives to extract patterns from any given situation, no matter how random the signals. Pattern Recognition gives us a sense of order and therefore comfort, by telling us that everything does in fact happen for a reason. Even (especially) when it doesn’t.To put your light-bending in context, this is also why people see the face of Jesus in tortillas.<br />
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Before you get all upset and start warming up the hate mail machines, let me explain that I was wanting to post a Devil’s Advocate position on the existence of magic. There are many who claim <a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=wired-for-weird&WT.mc_id=SA_CAT_MB_20120104" target="_blank" title="Scientific American Magazine">magic doesn’t exist</a>, or is merely an elaborate fraud, and they have excellent reasons for believing it. Magic being a relatively unexplored skillset in terms of actual scientific method, there are a lot of elements in traditional magic which may or may not be part of actually producing results.<br />
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My reasons for writing this aren’t to discourage anyone from the practice of magic, far from it. I wanted to present the counter-argument to magic so that you can practice better magic, cutting out most instances of self-delusion that can weaken your overall magical career. After all, when the chips are down and you’re working magic to correct a really important situation, wouldn’t you rather know what’s really going on?<br />
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Another psychological phenomenon which tends to lead people into attributing supernatural causes to mundane phenomena is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_detection" target="_blank" title="imaginary friends.">Agency Detection</a>. This is the mental process present in every animal species as a survival mechanism. It works by attributing unusual phenomena to a non-natural source, to put the animal on its guard by activating its defense mechanisms. For example, hearing a twig snap in the forest or hearing a creaking sound in a dark house at night. Both of these phenomena put both humans and animals on guard, and the first impulse is to assume some living thing caused these noises.<br />
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This is also postulated as the reason early humans developed the idea of religion, and the modern manifestation of this is the religio-political drive toward teaching <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design_creationism" target="_blank" title="Monotheistic Hogwash">Intelligent Design</a> in schools. Crowley himself even claimed that the spirits of the Goetia (and, by extension, pretty much every other spirit magicians work with) were nothing more than specific portions of the unconscious mind. Ironically, this was the keynote of his introduction to the Lesser Key of Solomon, a book dedicated to the notion that these spirits had independent existence!<br />
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<strong>Wait, if all magic is pattern recognition and all religion is agency detection, wouldn’t somebody have noticed this?</strong> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias" target="_blank" title="Not in a million years, buddy.">Probably not.</a> The same psychological mechanisms which cause these operations also filters out information which doesn’t fit your comfort zone. Basically speaking, you will forget most of the times you “pushed” a street light and failed, and place greater mental emphasis on the memories of when you succeeded. This is simple Darwinism – you continue practices which have worked in the past and therefore place greater emphasis on success than on failure.<br />
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<strong>Why would people keep doing magic for thousands of years if it didn’t really work?</strong> Because it appears to, and the appearance is everything. Human beings go to great lengths to avoid discomfort, and ritual is very comforting. People enjoy the familiar because it distracts us from the chaos of everyday life, and even the most absurd superstitions produce <em>just</em> enough “results” to provide a sense of having confirmed them.<br />
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<strong>So how do I know I’m actually doing real magic, and not just fooling myself?</strong> In all likelihood, you don’t. The casual user only does magic once or twice a month, not nearly enough to notice any discrepancies in the pattern. Religious users are even less likely to notice, since very few people actually pray for something tangible they can count as an undeniable success. Most prayers are for “God’s will to be done” or for “someone’s soul”, which cannot possibly have any tangible result whether it succeeds or fails.<br />
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<strong>Are you saying James Randi is right, and magic doesn’t exist?</strong> No, unequivocally. James Randi is subject to the same psychological phenomena, and since his focus is that magic doesn’t exist, his confirmation bias highlights the times he judges psychics to have failed and ignores the times they have succeeded, even when they’ve succeeded repeatedly under lab conditions in his own facility. Interestingly enough, his website seems to suffer from confirmation bias as well, and successful psychic demonstrations have been inexplicably not included in his new website’s archives.<br />
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<strong>Are you saying James Randi is wrong, and magic does exist?</strong> No, unequivocally. It’s impossible to explore these phenomena objectively with a human brain, subject as it is to pattern recognition and confirmation bias.<br />
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<strong>How can I avoid falling into either of these traps? </strong>Start paying attention to the results of every working. Keep a journal if you have to. If you really want to try “pushing” traffic lights, bring a lawn chair and sit on the corner and spend a couple hours manipulating both sets of lights and mark down in a notebook each time you were or weren’t able to cause the light to change from green to yellow in a few seconds.<br />
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If you’re trying more for spells than telekinesis, pick one spell you feel you’ve had success with in the past and cast it ten times on different subjects. Do it the same each time, and take note of when you achieved the desired effect and when you didn’t. Use the same standards of success in each case.<br />
Plus, do more magic. Do magic all the time, in every given situation. LIVE like a magician. When you’re doing a hundred small acts of magic every day, you’ll find out pretty quickly what produces results and what doesn’t. Confirmation bias only works as well as it does because of sample size – if you’re only doing magic a couple times a month it’s not enough of an influence on your life to remember the failures. Therefore, doing more magic means more input, and you’ll quickly figure out which acts of magic actually produce the desired results.<br />
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And honestly, at the end of the day, that’s the reason for every serious magician to do magic in the first place – to produce results. If your magic isn’t working for you, not making your life better, not giving you a greater level of agency in your life, why are you doing it at all?<br />
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<em>“Success is your proof; courage is your armour; go on, go on, in my strength; & ye shall turn not back for any!”</em> – Liber ALWadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-44752193989478119462012-10-29T03:23:00.000-07:002012-10-29T04:05:29.365-07:00On Initiation<em>Initiation.</em><br />
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We all think of different things when we hear the word, but there would be few people indeed who had no reference whatsoever for initiation. For some of us, it brings to mind lighthearted pranks on the New Guy, or brutal fraternity hazing, or a series of membership tasks to overcome, or even just paying a ridiculous fee for a new gym membership.<br />
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For those of us in spiritual communities, however, Initiation is much more heavily weighted. Rituals of Initiation convey a sense of spiritual authority, access to deeper and more subtle levels of a mystery tradition, exposure to volatile secrets, or even actual rank within a spiritual body. Having experienced a ritual of Initiation, the candidate can rightfully expect to "shift gears" in the group, to be a more active participant, entrusted with power and a greater share of stewardship. Initiation conveys a great many things in spiritual traditions, all of which have one thing in common:<br />
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<em>They are granted to the Candidate by a superior.</em><br />
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These benefits must be bestowed upon the Candidate by a member of higher standing, who is actually in a position to bestow them in truth and not just symbolically. This absolutely requires that the person performing the Initiation be superior to the Candidate in terms of knowledge, experience and authority. Otherwise there is nothing to bestow and growth is impossible. The sun grows the tree because the sun has more light and heat - it's a simple matter of physics. The tree does <em>nothing</em> for the sun, because it has nothing to offer and no way to get it there.<br />
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To fully understand what this means, we'll first need to explore what the spiritual process of Initiation does in terms of its effect on the Candidate. Rituals of Initiation exist to prompt a specific degree and direction of spiritual evolution in the new member, using symbolic words and actions to simulate the natural conditions which would cause the human soul to become greater. These natural conditions have existed since before humans, but often the very same tension which forces spiritual evolution on a person could just as easily kill them or drive them insane. Early man quickly learned to recreate these conditions in (relatively) safe, controlled environments in order to produce a shaman class which had all been exposed to the same mysteries, and whose souls had made the same quantum leap forward. This experience can only be recreated by those who know the proper conditions and how to guide the Candidate through them safely.<br />
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<em>Side note: Sometimes the ritual doesn't "take", and the symbolism fails to prompt the necessary evolution in the Candidate, but this is rare. Properly composed and performed, a good initiation ritual will have the desired effect if the Candidate is ready and well-prepared.</em><br />
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In other traditions, Initiation involves the candidate being introduced to the principal spirits of that tradition, and being vouched-for by an experienced Elder who has been that way before and is well known to the spirits involved. This is a very important form of Initiation, because it establishes a safe and reliable working relationship with all the most powerful forces that tradition works with, and without this introduction the candidate is putting himself in grave danger.<br />
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Which brings us to the notion of "Self Initiation". Many neopagan traditions offer the idea of initiating oneself into their tradition, if a suitable Master is not available. The rise of occult publishing and later, the internet, has increased the spread of this idea. Personally, I cannot strongly enough convey my disapproval of this idea, naturally because of the fact that it's impossible but more importantly for the fact that it's dangerous.<br />
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Properly understanding the nature of Initiation and all the process entails, how on earth could it be possible to perform an act of Initiation on oneself? Rituals of Initiation require the Candidate be exposed to mysteries and symbolism which are to have a fresh effect, and also be made privy to certain teachings and new techniques, all of which is impossible to gift to oneself. The idea of properly initiating oneself is as absurd as literally hoisting oneself into the air by the belt. Not only is the Candidate's strength insufficient for the task, there is nowhere for him to stand to accomplish this. <em><u>He literally has no foundation to perform this action.</u></em><br />
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Now, it's possible to self-<em>dedicate</em> in a tradition, to swear this oath or that oath to the deity of your choice. That's another thing entirely. A person can pray for a natural act of spiritual evolution, but given the stress involved this probably isn't wise. For all intents and purposes, there is no way to actually initiate oneself into <u>any</u> tradition. Period.<br />
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We've seen how it's impossible, and I also mentioned that it's dangerous. Initiation conveys a certain degree of spiritual authority, but this authority is only based on the practical application of having learned and applied new experiences. Without that experience, the authority is empty. I like to think of "Self Initiated" people as the mall-cops of the spiritual world - they're all bark and no bite, and when the chips are down they're simply not up to the task of performing with the same degree of excellence one could expect from a true Initiate.<br />
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<strong>Moral of the Story</strong>: Put in the time and effort to find a Master, and receive the mysteries in the proper manner. If you don't have it in you to do it right, do you think you have it in you to fix the mess you're going to make?Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-7228513832423392912012-01-07T11:13:00.000-08:002012-01-07T11:15:22.682-08:00Jackal's Apprentice - How I Met Ebony Anpu, Part I "Looking for the O.T.O. huh?"<br />
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I turned to look over my shoulder and was somewhat disconcerted to discover someone already there. He was a little taller than myself, with wispy black hair and a jack-o-lantern grin.<br />
I'd been in town for only a few weeks, although I suppose "in town" would be a somewhat generous description because I was in the Navy at the time, stationed aboard the U.S.S. Samuel Gompers. I didn't really live in any town. I did get into Oakland and San Francisco quite a bit though, and I'd been exploring what the Bay Area's various occult bookstores had to offer. At the moment, I was in Ancient Ways.<br />
Now, I'd been in occult bookstores before. The first one was in Erie but it was more New Age than occult, with lots of crystals and singing bowls. Very little in the way of spellbooks. There was Harry's in Philadelphia, which was very much like an old-world apothecary, but the first really impressive magic shop I'd been to was The Magickal Childe in New York City. It was marvelous - you could practically feel the evil oozing out into the street. Still, Ancient Ways had quickly become my new favorite.<br />
One wall was full of books, the other full of herbs. Glass display cases showed off various curios and artifacts from this tradition or that, along with jewelry, tarot cards and all manner of ritual tools. And, as I was about to find out, Ancient Ways also offered classes. At the moment, I'd been flipping through their class schedule when I came across a flyer for Thelema Lodge OTO.<br />
I'd read about Ordo Templi Orientis and the Golden Dawn, and other magical orders in my books, but I'd never met anyone who was actually a member of any of them. Once in Philadelphia, I'd asked a store owner if he had any personal experience with the OTO. He lowered his voice and asked "Are you a member?" and when I said no he leaned back and said "Well,<em> I </em>don't think they really exist." It didn't help.<br />
So I spent the afternoon pestering Ebony about the OTO, and I came back to attend his Ceremonial Magic classes. Aside from a few bumps in the road (like having to explain to him that not everyone knew Solomonic Hebrew) it went really well. Everyone attending learned a lot about the structure of ritual, most importantly how to recognize and use ceremonial formulas.<br />
So that became my life. I conveniently moved in across the street from Ancient Ways, and I'd endure days in the Navy so I could rush home and go to Ebony's class or go hang out at Ebony's house. Everything became a lesson, whether we were pawing through his library, frankensteining a computer together out of spare parts or just getting high and playing chess. I was regularly attending the Gnostic Mass at Thelema Lodge on 63rd street and getting to know everyone in the community. For the first time in my life, I was receiving formal instruction in magic from someone who was an actual Master. <br />
Life was good.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-76627869310042648182011-12-03T09:12:00.000-08:002011-12-03T09:12:24.607-08:00The Engines of MagicA close friend and respected colleague asked me an important question today. He asked me why I organize the apprenticeship grades of training according to the four philosophical elements, earth, air, water and fire. I understand that it seems trite to do it that way because that's the way almost every major magical tradition does it, but in answering his question I reviewed my reasoning and thought it was something that I should pass on to my readers.<br />
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Like all magicians, I based a good deal of my training curriculum on Liber 185 and Liber 13, by Aleister Crowley, both being short treatises on the gradations of training and expectations at each level thereof......well, okay maybe not *all* magicians. I found Crowley's regimen to be reasonable and practical and, although I didn't know why at the time, it just seemed right.<br />
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There were flaws with it, naturally. I thought that Crowley's focus on Yoga seemed excessive, and lacking in perspective given the wide variety of world traditions that produce the same effects if done properly, not to mention the traditions that have only come to light since Crowley's death. I also found it somewhat egotistical that Crowley insisted his students had to commit various libers of his own authorage to memory. I studied long and hard to discover the "engine" that fuelled his magical curriculum, so as to sidestep all the junk and discover the operative elements inside.<br />
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I began studying Crowley's "Liber Collegii Sancti" curriculum with an eye to Game Theory and Metagame Theory (especially Mechanical Design), in the sense that the operations of practical magic, i.e. causing change in conformity with Will, functioned according to specific rules by which certain energies, forces or masses could be moved about with impunity as long as a balance was maintained therein. Study of the LCS material provided me with a deep insight into practical magic.<br />
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Magic is communication.<br />
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Pure and simple. The art and science of causing change entails forcing the universe to adopt a reality other than the status quo, with the magnitude of said change composing the resistance to it, and therefore the amount of work involved. This communication with the Universe is done via symbols. The more personal and involving any element of ritual is, the more power it adds to the magician's attempt to communicate his will to the Universe. This is the reason for discovering one's own set of symbols, as opposed to simply adopting the set of an established magical system. Yes, with an established magical system you'll be able to work in concert with everyone else using that system, but it will never be *the best* system to use for your own personal work.<br />
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In human terms, the quotient of status quo functions as "belief", the strength of the belief being the resistance to change. When a person is presented with factual and indisputable evidence which contradicts his previously adopted beliefs, he experiences a psychological phenomenon known as "Cognitive Dissonance", in which two realities collide and he experiences great discomfort from the sudden realization that two conflicting ideologies cannot both be acceptable.<br />
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Quite often, a person can deal with the discomfort of Cognitive Dissonance by ignoring or dismissing the new information, or finding whatever excuse is necessary to avoid dealing with it. As they say, ignorance is bliss. Truth, however, will not be long contained and will tend to fester in the back of the person's mind, poisoning his psychological comfort and making him bitter toward any expression or reminder of the discomforting knowledge.<br />
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Changing a person's mind is a matter of persuasion, and a sufficiently persuasive argument can compel an otherwise rational human being to wholeheartedly believe something which is patently and obviously false. When hypnosis is involved (taking control of a person's sensory input filters), the difficulty in so doing is greatly reduced. This is the human parallel to performing an act of magic.<br />
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In magic, the magician communicates his will to the universe, much in the same sense as delivering the opening statement of a debate. The magician says "Things are thus." and the universe replies "No, things are THUS.", and depending upon the effectiveness of his communication, the magician's will is either accepted or rejected by the Universe. Quite often, there is a partial change, in which the universe overcomes a portion of its cognitive dissonance to arrive at a compromise between the status quo and the Will of the magician. This would constitute a partial success, and more often than not even sloppy magic will achieve some degree of manifestation.<br />
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So, how do we effectively communicate our will to the Universe? The same way as we communicate information to other humans, animals or objects. Remember, operating on any given thing is a form of communication. Pushing a human is the same message as pushing a rock, the only difference being that a human is able to obey on his own. Language is one of the most common forms of communication, but what do you do when the two persons communicating do not share a language? They use gestures and drawings. This is an example of crossing the planes of communication. For the purposes of simplicity, these are the planes I use:<br />
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Earth - Gestures, tokens and touch<br />
Air - Words, ideograms and other direct visual or spoken representations<br />
Water - Color, music, scent and other forms of impressionism and/or intuition<br />
Fire - Telepathy, clairvoyance and other forms of "grok"<br />
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Each level of communication has an advantage and disadvantage when compared to the others. For example, telepathy can communicate vast amounts of complex information which can take seconds to communicate but hours to process and understand, but it's extremely difficult for beginners to achieve accurate rapport in this form of communication. When one level of communication is insufficiently accurate to produce a genuine connection, the problem can be solved by dropping down to the next level and trying again. For example, when two people do not speak the same language (air), they resort to gestures and pictures (earth) which decreases the volume of communication at the same time it increases the accuracy of the information communicated, or at least increases the chances of communicatory rapport.<br />
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Translating human communication to magic isn't very difficult. Once you accept the model of "practical magic" as communicating one's desires to the universe in the form of a compelling argument, the only hurdle left is to open lines of communication by which to present that argument. Magical technique begins properly with Earth, the use of physical amulets or materials which in and of themselves convey certain types of energy and therefore act as filters to transform the magician's energy into whatever "flavour" best suits the purpose of his communication to the universe. For example, if he wishes to increase his physical fortitude, the magician could put his energy into a chunk of bloodstone. Much as a coloured gel transforms white light shined through it, magical elements transform whatever energy is directed through them to radiate a specific magical energy determined by the virtues of the physical element itself. The bloodstone absorbs his undifferentiated energy and radiates it back out, filtered through its own virtues to be a source of energy which fortifies the body, increases physical strength and causes wounds to heal quickly. <br />
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This level of communication also includes gestures, which I tend to break down into great and small. Great gestures are whole-body stances or movements for use in ritual. Using the entire body, the magician puts a great deal of meaning into these gestures, and therefore a lot of juice. Small gestures are nothing more than one-or two-hand versions of the great gestures, to be used in situations where it may not be possible or advisable to use the great gestures, for example on a crowded subway or in church.<br />
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Tokens are an easily misunderstood part of Earth magic. A token is something which is a direct tactile representation of the thing to be worked with. A toy car, tiny wooden house, a "voodoo doll", or Monopoly money, are all items which qualify as "tokens", and are easily used in Earth magic. For example, a magician might have a doll or photograph representing himself, and as part of a money drawing ritual he might perform a daily routine in which he counts out and stacks up a large amount of money on top of the photograph. This collection of items would be left out on his altar, dresser top or anywhere prominent where he would see it every day and therefore reinforce the message "I HAVE THIS AMOUNT OF MONEY!", and if the message gets sent strongly enough, the Universe will accept his argument and the money will arrive. Side note: I would actually *not* use Monopoly money, but print out small hundred dollar bills on a copier or computer printer, because the message is that it should represent real money.<br />
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For Air, the use of words and ideograms steps up the volume of communication available, as long as the words and symbols used dovetail with those of the magician. Most traffic signs are perfect examples of ideograms, as is the Chinese language. They are somewhat abstract drawings illustrating the message, which can be quite detailed even with a simple ideogram.<br />
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These ideograms can be as crude or artistic and detailed as you like. The more eye-catching it is, the better. Note that I didn't say "attractive", because there are uses for ideograms which are utterly repellent in certain situations. The best part of using ideograms is that you can paint them directly ON the object of your magic. I.E. painting wards on your door lintel, or embroidering them into your clothing. I highly recommend using Chinese calligraphy sets for this, since the ink must be made fresh each time, allowing the magician to really get concentrating on the outcome of his work.<br />
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Water magic is all about how you use emotion and intuition to cause change. Colors, scents, music all have incredible power to "set the stage" and "create a feel" which tends to put most people in the area into a specific mindset. The drawback is that it doesn't tend to communicate detailed information well, but rather overwhelms the senses with compelling input to create the desired mindset. This is why hospitals are painted in cool, neutral tones while nightclubs tend to be black or dark colors with brightly colored lights and loud music.<br />
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While water magic *can* be used as a stand-alone set of techniques, it is often employed as an enhancement to other ritual methods. A ritual setup is much more compelling and powerful when the room is draped in red fabric, with spicy cinnamon incense burning and drummers pounding away. Face it - it's pretty difficult NOT to get directly into the desired headspace in that situation, but it often isn't enough to "turn the trick" by itself - there needs to be a specific set of symbolic actions taken to direct this energy toward the desired end. This is why water magic tends to dovetail nicely with earth magic.<br />
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Fire magic is without a doubt the perfect epitome of practical magic, and as such it is both the simplest form of magic *and* at the same time the most subtle and difficult to master. Fire magic is the act of directly willing something to come into being, and having it happen. Yes, it sounds very easy to simply decide that things are going to be a certain way, but it's not so easy to convince your unconscious mind to play along. <br />
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For starters, the magician has his own Cognitive Dissonance to conquer, which can be overcome through the use of lesser forms of magic or through supreme force of will. I'm not going to get into detail concerning the development of fire magic or the specific practices therein, as such would be beyond the scope of this compact rant.<br />
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Once the magician has mastered fire magic, he will have essentially mastered all the skills he will ever need to practice any form of magic or achieve any goal he should desire. While there is never any guarantee of "success" in practical magic, having acquired the necessary skills (and most importantly, the mindset and understanding of mechanics) of magic, he will stand head and shoulders above other magicians, and heavens above the common man.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-4374770457755425292011-11-14T12:17:00.000-08:002011-12-01T10:36:57.497-08:00The War is Over. Long Live the War. Every year we're visited by the same war controversy. Not Iraq or Afghanistan or some other third world country - right here at home. Every year the Christians complain that we non-Christians are waging some kind of "War on Christmas", throwing frantic histrionics any time they're not allowed to dominate the Winter Solstice.<br />
How does this "War" show itself? If a Walmart greeter dares wish someone "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" during the month of December, it's guaranteed that <i>some </i>patron is going to throw a fit and screech about how Walmart just made Baby Jesus cry. Never mind that Christmas <i>is </i>one of the holidays in "Happy Holidays". Never mind that Winter Solstice celebrations like Yule and Hannukah are much much <i>older </i>than Christmas - Christians get extremely upset any time they're not allowed to have total and exclusive hegemonic domination over the entire month of December.<br />
But let's back up about a month here ... let's leave aside for a moment how absurd it is to even present the idea that someone could actually wage some kind of "War" on a holiday. Let's not even apply rational thought to that notion for now, because it just happened last month. That's right, I'm talking about the <a href="http://jesusween.com/" target="_blank">War on Halloween</a>. The very same people bitterly sobbing about the War on Christmas just finished waging War on Halloween. Some were even politicizing it, arguing that Trick-or-Treating was <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/low_concept/2011/10/the_republican_war_on_halloween_trick_or_treating_kids_shouldn_t.html" target="_blank">training our children to beg for government handouts</a>. And their "War" was every bit of a non-starter in practical terms as some sort of "War on Christmas" would be.<br />
The War on Halloween was particularly sad - "JesusWeen" presented an alternative to pagan celebrations that honor our ancestors, an alternative in which children were encouraged to dress up as Bible characters and play Biblically-themed games. It was designed to steal focus from Halloween and let children <i>participate in the very same activities as traditional Halloween</i>, but in service to the Christian God.<br />
Sound familiar?<br />
This is the very same invade-and-colonize tactic that Christians have always deployed. They don't like a particular holiday because it's something that belongs to another culture and impedes their domination of a region. The Church did their level best to invade and colonize every major pagan holiday. Imbolc became Candlemas. Samhain became All Saints Eve. Yule became Christmas. The Church was upset that their peasants and workers had even the slightest bit of liberation from Christianity, and they had to move in and dominate every single aspect of life.<br />
In short, JesusWeen is the very same sort of spiritual imperialism that created Christmas in the first place.<br />
So once again, the Christians are upset that the peasants are able to take enjoyment in something the Church doesn't control. And they created JesusWeen, quite possibly the lamest waste of time since the Maginot Line. Granted, the only participants were the children of devout Christians, or other parents vulnerable to religious pressure, but they counted it as a "success" because those children wouldn't be celebrating Halloween with all us damn dirty Pagans.<br />
Maybe they were hoping it would catch on, that somehow dressing up as Moses and seeing who could recite the longest Bible verse could be considered by some to be more fun than going door to door and shaking down total strangers for mass-critical amounts of candy. It's not <i>my </i>thing, but I'm sure it appeals to someone.<br />
In any event, the Christians are <a href="http://www.waronchristmas.com/" target="_blank">warming up the Outrage Machine™</a> for this year's edition of the War on Christmas. It's not enough to wish someone "Happy Holidays" which include Christmas, because it implies that there are other Winter Solstice holidays worthy of recognition by the cultures that celebrate them. Unless you only say "Merry Christmas", unless you ONLY pay homage to the stolen Christian holiday, the Church won't stand for it. Again, some on the Right are politicizing this, trying to use their outrage to <a href="http://www.bnd.com/2011/11/14/1941044/phony-war-on-christmas-distorted.html" target="_blank">score points against the President</a>.<br />
Is this really how their god wants them to spend their time? Don't these people have stuff to do? Rational people are staying out of the debate entirely, and <a href="http://defendchristmas.com/" target="_blank">avoiding both sides of the issue</a> so they can enjoy a peaceful, joyful holiday season with their families.<br />
So, whatever holidays you celebrate between November and February, try to keep them happy.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-81886588186014049332011-10-31T11:17:00.000-07:002011-10-31T11:17:41.274-07:00Opening RitualsIf you pick up nearly any book on the practice of magic, you'll find several examples of Circle Castings -- those rituals magicians use before casting larger spells or performing ceremonies. Often these are not explained in terms of necessity, variation, or the function they serve in the greater ritual as a whole. For this reason, many magicians dismiss the idea entirely as being too "complicated" or "a waste of time", but nothing could be farther from the truth. If you have the desire to cast a spell right, and the time to perform the ritual at all, you have time to cast a Circle. It'll pay off.<br />
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Some people think of circles as "protection" (as in "why summon evil forces and protect yourself from them unless you're some kind of pussy?!"), and I can assure you in no uncertain terms that a circle will not protect you from a determined attacker. Wards will not protect you from a determined attacker. Talismans will not protect you from a determined attacker. Even those ubiquitous astral mirrors you hear the new-agers clucking over will not protect you from a determined attacker. Circles are not for protection. Circles are for containment.<br />
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What do they contain?<br />
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<i>You.</i><br />
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A ritual is essentially the setting in motion of certain forces. Nobody knows or should care what these forces are or specifically why they operate -- the laws that govern them are well known, and this is enough. The purpose of using "Opening Rituals" like the Opening by Watchtower, Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, Greater Pentagram, Supreme Pentagram, Greater and Supreme Hexagram, Star Ruby, Star Sapphire, etc ad nauseam, is to set "lab conditions" within the space where you are doing your working. This usually only needs to be about six or eight feet for a single magician at work, slightly larger if he has seated assistants acting as batteries.<br />
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Now you have your space. First you want everything to be Just Right, so if you don't have a dedicated Temple space then the same room is going to be cluttered with various other random thoughts and astral attachments from whatever activities go on in there. What do we do about that? Picture your Temple space like a cooking pan. It should be clean before you cook, unless you're cooking the same thing the next day (bachelor cuisine thinking). Now, the elements you're working with are as vague or detailed as you want, but they will all come in one of three settings: Ambient (natural), Dampened (by banishing) or Heightened (by invoking). You want everything to be Just Right for your ritual, so you want compatible elements to be set on Heightened and opposing elements to be set on Dampened. Everything else can be Ambient because it shouldn't affect your work.<br />
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<i>Intermission: This is not as complex as it sounds. This only requires the same amount of forethought as planning a road trip - having your mix tape, sunglasses, water bottle and map. People typically put more thought into a first date than is required preparation for a ritual.</i><br />
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So let's say you're doing a working of Wrath (I go there in my examples, because I've done a lot of Wrath in my day). Let's be trite and say we're invoking Mars. And not just Mars, but specifically Bartzabel, the planetary Spirit of Mars. So how should be open the Temple? What sets the conditions just right for a working of Wrath? Well, we could invoke Mars directly with a planetary Hexagram ritual. That's easy enough. But let's go back a step and see if we can even make the Mars invocation more potent. Invoke Fire. That could even be helped further by banishing Water first.<br />
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So you banish Water, invoke Fire, and invoke Mars. You have set opposing elements to a dampened state, and heightened elements aligned with your work (which you still haven't actually started yet....). The Temple at this point may become very warm, and you may be delighting in fantasies of kicking someone's ass in. Music helps. How else could we make this ritual more powerful before we actually perform the evocation of Bartzabel?<br />
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<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/oto/lib200.html"> Liber Resh</a> is a ritual designed to align the magician with the sun by performing a specific invocation at the four stations of the sun, but this ritual is easily adapted to any of the planets. Simply find out where Mars is in relation to the Sun (space.com has a wonderful astronomical simulator called Starry Night Backyard which is perfect for this), and switch the timing of the invocations to correspond to when Mars is rising, aloft, setting, and occulted. Do this for, say, five days (Mars' number) and by the day of your invocation you should be just blazing with Mars energy for your work (which you still haven't actually started yet....). Now, Liber Resh is a ritual specific to the OTO but anyone with a little creativity could easily modify the essential concept to their own work. Take out all the Egyptian mumbo-jumbo and it lends itself readily to any other system.<br />
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See how these rituals work? They're there to enhance certain energies and dampen other ones, to make you a more suitable vessel for the work you're setting in motion. A lot of people dismiss ceremonial magic out of hand because of all the frittering around it requires, but once you've done one really good working you know where all that extra effort is paying off.<br />
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The symbolic actions entailed in any given Opening Ritual, whether banishing or invoking, all serve to create very real changes within the person performing them, very much akin to warming up and stretching before a big workout. Opening Rituals "limber up" the magical muscles you're about to use, and get you primed for action. Banishing isn't any more "necessary" than showering, and invocation isn't any more "necessary" than putting on clean clothes, but doing both keeps you clean and healthy and fit for the world in which you seek to act. NOT doing at least some form of preparatory work leaves you at the mercy of your environment, which is a distinct disadvantage in most cases. It only makes sense to chase the bad stuff off and put the good stuff on.<br />
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So, once you have all the proper switches turned on or off, go ahead and perform your ritual. It may be as much as ten times more powerful as it would be if you hadn't taken the time to properly open your Temple. The Opening by Watchtower is nice, but I'd recommend writing your own version of it once you've become proficient with the ritual itself. Remember, the point isn't what ritual you use, it's what results you achieve. And you only get out of it what you put into it.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-80706842145083528162011-10-31T10:52:00.000-07:002011-10-31T10:52:13.197-07:00On Power Sometimes I sit and muse on the world. I consider its conditions and its residents and the various happentracks the future may take. I compare its current state with the vision of the world I want to create, and I decide what needs to be done.<br />
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Most of the "evil" in the world stems from a lack of personal power. People steal because they lack money or resources. They rape because they lack sexual security. They hoard money and resources because they fear being without. They kill people out of fear for the threat they pose. All these activities create further insecurity and instability in the lives of those who practice them, rather than decreasing it.<br />
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The standard solution to insecurity is money. Everyone is on a great quest for greater and greater amounts of money, and if they can just get enough money they'll be "set for life", but no amount of money is ever enough. Plus, even with a windfall of several million dollars, the recipient pays tax on the money. Then he pays tax on the things he buys. Then he pays upkeep FOR the things he buys, which is usually taxed as well.<br />
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Increasing personal power is the natural solution to the constant dilemma of security and stability. Magic can get you all the things money can, and many things it can't, and there is no tax on magic. Rich people spend the bulk of every day of their lives chasing money they already have, trying desperately just to break even at the end of the day. At the same time, people with magic are enjoying their lives, perhaps only receiving and spending small amounts of money but enjoying immensely satisfying access to resources that others would have to pay for.<br />
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The problem this creates is the problem people face when they suddenly acquire <i>any </i>amount of power - they tend to become jerks, at least for a little while. Any remotely attractive person suddenly becomes a sexual target. Anyone who acts annoying is immediately set upon with curses. Any stray whim or passing fancy <i>must </i>be acquired, no matter who it rightfully belongs to. Fortunately, this quickly gets old and the magician outgrows it, but all too often this doesn't propel them to move forward. Rather, they feel they've outgrown magic altogether, they give up on exercising power and fall into a routine of passive spirituality, "believing" in magic but not using it.<br />
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One solution to this ennui is exploration. Everything becomes stale eventually, so it's simply a matter of finding new uses for it. This is why there are so many websites with video games on them. Computers have given us so much power that we can do practically any information-related task with them (he says in his blog) but even that level of ability gets stale and periodically needs refreshment. Find something entertaining to do with your magic - rig the Oscars if you like, or manage celebrity breakups. Or find something noble - dispel hurricanes before they hit cities, bust up a drug ring or foil a political campaign. The possibilities are limitless.<br />
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My vision of the future is a world where magic has become as commonplace as computers -- most everyone will use it or encounter it in their daily routine, and it will have ceased to be the sole purvue of reclusive nerds and sinister maniacs. After all, magic is our birthright. It's programmed into our brains, our minds and our souls. It's ours to use, and we have no reason to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune when we control the ammunition.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-30397741708013814642011-10-31T10:03:00.000-07:002011-10-31T10:10:12.016-07:00Turning Magic into Work and Turning Work into PowerIn the science of physics, Work is done when the proper force is applied to the proper object in the proper manner. Any failure of force, application or object results in no Work being done. In the art of Magic, the same principle is true. If the proper force is applied to the proper object in the proper manner, certain results follow. The most common errors causing failure are:<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">Wrong Force</span>:</b> Attempting to use magic in a manner unsuitable for the chosen intent, i.e. "letting karma take care of" people who disagree with oneself (it's the lazy man's way of saying "I'm right but I can't prove it or do anything about it!") , "reflecting negativity back" on someone you don't like (you're still consciously directing harmful energy at your victim, so why not go for the gusto?), or seeking a new lover by "increasing your own sense of self-love and personal attraction" (have you ever SEEN the kinds of creeps that stalk attractive people? Want more of that?).<br />
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All these errors are consciously made in the interest of avoiding personal responsibility for wanting to do something selfish, i.e. perform practical magic in one's own interests. Best avoided by owning up to allowing yourself a bit of self-serving activity once in awhile.<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">Wrong Application</span>:</b> Most magical failure stems from just plain doing it wrong. Anyone in the manufacturing industry can tell you "there's a trick to everything" which massively simplifies the job at hand, and tends to work out better than taking the long way around the barn.<br />
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These are errors like doing magic to win the lottery or other games of chance. Magic requires concentration and intent, and since nearly everyone playing ANY games of chance is willing themselves to win, using magic to boost your chances would be only marginally successful. It's like putting on the pads and uniform and jumping into an NFL playoff game, just to acquire a football, when you could easily go purchase one at Big 5 Sporting Goods. Get the picture?<br />
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There's a trick to everything which doesn't involve conflict. Want to get rid of a troublesome co-worker? Do a spell to get them a better job somewhere else. They'll be delighted to go and you'll get brownie points with the universe for having done them a favor. Need money? Do a spell to bring you the things you needed the money for in the first place, like getting the landlord to spot you a month's rent for doing some minor work around the property, instead of doing the standard money-grubbing spells.<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">Wrong Object</span>: </b>Most of the time people, not just magicians, tend to have no idea how to actually get what they want out of life. They spend entirely too much time banging their heads against all the wrong walls, and they end up getting nowhere with it.<br />
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For example, an associate of yours is absolutely insufferable, but also untouchable because he has endeared himself to a powerful, wealthy or influential person also of your acquaintance. Instead of directly attacking the person or their benefactor, why not direct your will to cause a subtle correction in their personality which causes them to be somewhat less useful to the Big Guy?<br />
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<i>Everyone protects their interests, but almost nobody protects their talents.</i><br />
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What about that hot chick down the hall who has no interest in your various charms? Instead of forcing her to love you by impairing her judgement (love spells are so crude), why not acquire yourself something which makes you a hell of a lot more interesting to her? This might be a new car, or an exciting hobby, or even a date with her best friend. Never underestimate the power of envy to really motivate someone.<br />
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In all, most magic fails because people just plain don't think it through. Take the time to figure out what you want, how best to make that happen, and most importantly, what else your actions might cause. It doesn't do any good to win eight million dollars if you got it in a lawsuit from the bus that ran you over and left you paralyzed.<br />
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In short, there <i>is</i> a trick to everything. Figuring out what those tricks are is what turns a garden-variety dilletante into a true Archmagus.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-32829440819692905552011-10-07T18:30:00.000-07:002011-10-07T18:35:21.533-07:00The Magical Occupation of Wall StreetA couple days ago, I read an article about the Occupation of Wall Street in which the author complained that the protestors weren't providing a clear set of demands. It got me thinking about the movement in magical terms, and how this could be applied to a magician's daily life.<br />
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As it stands, the Occupation stands undefined, at least in any kind of concrete terms. The article's main complaint was that, without definition, the Occupation could never be assuaged or even coherently rebuffed. The author wanted a list of complaints and demands that he could logically deconstruct in order to dismiss the movement, but no such list existed.<br />
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Without a central authority and monolithic belief system, the Occupation might be less effective but is essentially indestructible. The protesters are very much there on Wall Street, and cannot be ignored, but their ideology is a fogbank - enormous and solid in general terms, intangible and invulnerable when you try to grasp it. Logically tackling the Occupation of Wall Street is impossible in the absence of manifestation.<br />
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Manifestation, in this case as well as most magical cases, is a matter of identification. Finding "some spirit" in your temple is fairly common, but it cannot be properly commanded or banished without discovering its name or sigil (or inventing an alternate nominative). In terms of the Wall Street Occupation however, the magical element of manifestation lies in the difficult task of finding a "handle" for the movement, some sort of centralized leadership or at the very least a constitutional document outlining the composition and directives of the movement. None such exists, for excellent reasons.<br />
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If there were a centralized leadership or monolithic belief structure laid out in one specific document, there would be some sort of leverage against the movement, since then the specifics could be divided, undermined and dismissed. Although there have been a number of laughable attempts by the mainstream media to construct from whole cloth a "list of demands", there have also been statements directly from participants in the Occupation in which it was made clear that any such "list of demands" is a media fabrication, or pulled from a few specific individuals who do not represent the Occupation.<br />
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The Occupation must remain unmanifest. The TEA Party is living proof of this - originally organized to protest the government bailout of Wall Street (sound familiar), it was quickly co-opted by the hard right and rebranded as a specific movement against the President. In magical terms, that particular spook was forced into manifestation and then forced to transform itself into a suitable tool of the Neoconservatives.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">***</div>The magical lesson here is simple: The unmanifest cannot be attacked except by attempting to force manifestation. In quantum mechanics, the Quantum Wave Function is a similar matter of identification - as long as the specifics remain unknown, the potential of the Occupation is virtually unlimited. The media may be deliberately attempting to examine and codify the Occupation specifically to weaken it, or perhaps simply because it makes for interesting headlines, but every attempt to define the Occupation in specifics is essentially an attempt to force the Occupation to incorporate. Corporations and their interests are specifically the problem that the Occupation is against, and there is nothing to be gained by stepping out onto that particular playing field.<br />
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Long Live the Occupation!Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-4045692302789938562011-08-19T11:53:00.000-07:002011-09-24T22:28:25.457-07:00Not Guilty but Guilty? Today, the West Memphis Three walked out of prison.<br />
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For more than 18 years, Damien Echols, Jessie Miskelley and Jason Baldwin have been imprisoned for the murders of three little boys, a conviction that was thready even at the time. When I first saw the documentary "Paradise Lost" ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LR2sVKssjsI ), I was frankly amazed at the total lack of evidence against them. I was also disgusted at the majority of public opinion which was basically that the boys were guilty "Because ... well, <i>LOOK at em!</i>" They were selected, accused, and convicted largely on public opinion that they were Satanists.<br />
Now, with DNA technology having made significant advances in the area of criminal forensics, it was made clear that <i>not a single shred</i> of DNA evidence collected at the scene could be connected to Echols, Miskelley OR Baldwin. In fact, the evidence from the crime scene was connected to Terry Hobbs, stepfather of one of the murdered children, who also happened to have been one of the most vocal accusers of the West Memphis Three. The DNA evidence was a hair sample, tied <i>inside </i>one of the knots hogtying the victims, which means Hobbs was <i>there at the crime scene at the time of the murders</i>.<br />
Under massive public pressure, the state grudgingly permitted reviews of the DNA evidence and denied a new trial in 2010, by order of the same judge who originally convicted them. After eight months of increased pressure and public outrage, the state of Arkansas announced that they would permit another hearing for a new trial, scheduled for today. Since the original judge, David Burnett, has since been elected to Congress, his past cases, judgements and appeals were certainly a matter of concern to his career but he was no longer in a position to simply deny a new trial to the West Memphis Three.<br />
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Jumping ahead of the evidentiary hearing, the state of Arkansas cut a deal with Echols, Miskelley and Baldwin, allowing them to walk free and maintain their innocence as long as they conceded on record that the state "probably had enough evidence to win a conviction".<br />
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It is anyone's guess if the "State of Arkansas" in this case was actually "Senator David Burnett", but this deal was certainly in his best interest. Having one of his most well-known decisions (and appeals) become international news hung a sword over his head and, in light of his new career in the Senate, the last thing he or the state of Arkansas would have wanted was for Burnett to be exposed as a fraud. Most shamefully, the original murderer has gotten away with it.<br />
So ... who's guilty here? Guilty of the original murders? Guilty of stealing 18 years from three innocent young men? Guilty of fraud? Guilty of lying about a murder? Guilty of sweeping it all under the rug<i> to save his job</i>? Most of all, everyone has lost sight of the greatest guilt of all, the guilt of allowing social pressure, career, politics, and public opinion to distract everyone enough to let a child-murderer walk away scot-free.<br />
Today was a great day for the West Memphis Three, if only that they finally get to pick up some semblance of "normal lives" again (aside from talk shows, book deals, and another movie being released this November) but they HAD normal lives already. 18 years of normal life was taken away from them, on the basis of nothing more than the fact that they were different. Still, the hugs and handshakes at their press conference shows that they're ready to get on with life. <br />
Most of all, you can tell they're ready to be at peace - just look at 'em.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-24284577174451804902011-07-17T10:26:00.000-07:002011-07-17T10:26:46.250-07:00Voldemort Needs Netflix<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div> Okay, it's easy to play Armchair Quarterback when you're watching a movie, but this time the urge was just too much. The world should have belonged to Voldemort. In his place, it would have belonged to me. Why?<br />
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Because I've seen Willow, Conan and the Ten Commandments.<br />
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It's a fairly formulaic plotline, where the Evil Ruler goes on an infant-murdering bender because there was a prophecy about an infant growing up to defeat him. Chances are, if he'd left well enough alone the infant would have grown up milking cows and gathering eggs in the mornings, and died a withered happy grandparent in a mud hut. Thulsa Doom made a similar mistake, seeking to crush his enemies and in the process creating a superwarrior who was ultimately the downfall of his snakes-and-hot-chicks empire.<br />
Voldemort was at the height of his power when the Harry Potter prophecy was given (although it also could have been Neville Longbottom), and if he'd left well enough alone he'd have been fine. Yes, there was a small resistance but the boy of the prophecy could not possibly have been any kind of threat for at least another eleven years when he entered school. That's eleven more years Voldemort could have been tightening his control and growing his power.<br />
Hell, we already saw that the forces of darkness could take over management of Hogwarts at will - why not just let both boys grow up in a tightly regimented environment where you have control over everything they're taught? There's a lesson in this for all of us.<br />
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<b><i>Never go out of your way to engineer your own destruction.</i></b><br />
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If something seems like it might be a problem, but in practical terms will distract you from maintaining focus on your overall goals, realize that by distracting you it has already achieved its goal. It IS a threat just by existing, because you give it power when you shift focus to it. By all means don't ignore it, but don't go out of your way to give it undue attention or it just might be your downfall without lifting a finger.<br />
Voldemort was, for all practical purposes, immortal. Aside from a few bad choices in Horcruxes, he could have continued forever, in the style of the Dalai Lama. He had legions of powerful followers, a dwindling resistance opposing him, and an extraordinary talent at magic, and he was still brought down by his own insecurity. This goes back to my assertion that there are certain common character traits that can make or break a magician, and these traits typically have nothing specifically to do with magic.<br />
When you think about it, the whole prophecy could have been a hoax and it would have worked just as well. Harry Potter had no extraordinary talents, and probably would have lived a fairly mediocre life as a wizard, until Voldemort invested in him the power to defeat a wizard of legendary powers.<br />
This has nothing to do with whether or not Voldemort or Harry was capable of love, or had friends, or was a spunky underdog rising to power.<br />
This has everything to do with the fact that Voldemort never saw Willow.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-5175725763569880012011-06-28T18:48:00.000-07:002011-06-30T15:37:50.848-07:00Ritual: The Rock Crystal I wanted to share with you one of my favorite rituals, but I need to give you a little context first. The year was 1993 and I was working hard toward Knowledge and Conversation (for those of you not obsessed with ceremonial magic, it's a ritual process designed to open direct permanent contact with your True Self, the part of you that is part of God). I was fresh out of the Navy and had pretty much nothing else to do with my life, so I was able to devote a large part of my time toward spiritual development, and it was some of the best time of my life.<br />
Now, in this ritual I'll be instructing you to draw pentagrams (specifically "Invoking Spirit Passive" and "Invoking Spirit Active Averse") but if you're not familiar with the standard use of pentagrams in ritual, feel free to perform your own invocatory (it's a word) practices at each given point in the ritual.<br />
"Invoking Spirit Passive" pentagrams begin at the lower left (7:30 on the clock), proceed up and right to 2:00, straight across to 10:00, down and right to 4:30, up to 12:00, and back down to close at 7:30. Some traditions like to repeat the initial line to emphasize the "flavor" of the pentagram. Do it or don't - it's up to you. This pentagram creates an atmosphere of "drawing" and it represents prayer or invocation, anticipating a response from Spirit. If you don't use pentagrams, you might choose to light a stick of incense here, or some other act of offering to Spirit.<br />
"Invoking Spirit Active Averse" begins at the upper right (1:30 on the clock), proceed left and down to 8:00, across to 4:00, up and left to 10:30, down to 6:00 and back up to close at 1:30. Again, you may choose to repeat the first line if you feel it adds something to the ritual. This pentagram represents the response from Spirit made manifest in yourself, and if you don't use pentagrams or if you're uncomfortable using averse pentagrams you may choose instead to light a small candle, smudge yourself with the aforementioned incense smoke, or perform some other symbolic act of receiving the gifts of Spirit.<br />
This isn't the appropriate space for discussing how to construct a Temple, or perform opening rituals. If you're reading this, I can safely assume you know how to generate sacred space.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>The Rock Crystal </b></span></div><br />
The ritual begins in the center of the Temple, facing south. This ritual will be describing a rough hexagram in the room, so if you want to be super prepared you can measure out the appropriate spaces, or even place six small altars evenly spaced around the circle at 2:00, 4:00, 6:00, 8:00, 10:00 and 12:00, 12:00 being north.<br />
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From the center, you will proceed to 2:00 (roughly northeast). There you will either draw the pentagram "Invoking Spirit Passive" or perform the appropriate ritual gesture. Repeat the following verse:<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><i>Thy feet in mire, thine head in murk,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> O man, how piteous thy plight,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The doubts that daunt, the ills that irk,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Thou hast nor wit nor will to fight—</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>How hope in heart, or worth in work?</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> No star in sight!</i></div><br />
Proceed then to 6:00 (due south), perform "Invoking Spirit Passive" and recite the following verse:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>Thy gods proved puppets of the priest.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> “Truth? All’s relation!” science sighed.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>In bondage with thy brother beast,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Love tortured thee, as Love’s hope died</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>And Love’s faith rotted. Life no least</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Dim star descried.</i></div><br />
Proceed to 10:00 (roughly northwest), "Invoke Spirit Passive" and recite the following:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>Thy cringing carrion cowered and crawled</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> To find itself a chance-cast clod</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Whose Pain was purposeless; appalled</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> That aimless accident thus trod</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Its agony, that void skies sprawled</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> On the vain sod!</i></div><br />
Proceed directly through the center of the circle and cross to 4:00 (roughly southeast), and either draw the pentagram "Invoking Spirit Active Averse" or perform the appropriate corresponding ritual gesture, and recite this verse:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>All souls eternally exist,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Each individual, ultimate,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Perfect—each makes itself a mist</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Of mind and flesh to celebrate</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>With some twin mask their tender tryst</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Insatiate.</i></div><br />
From there, proceed to 12:00 (due north), "Invoke Spirit Active Averse" and recite this verse:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>Some drunkards, doting on the dream,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Despair that it should die, mistake</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Themselves for their own shadow-scheme.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> One star can summon them to wake</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>To self; star-souls serene that gleam</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> On life’s calm lake.</i></div><br />
From 12:00, proceed to 8:00 (roughly southwest), "Invoke Spirit Active Averse" and recite the following verse:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>That shall end never that began.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> All things endure because they are.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Do what thou wilt, for every man</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> And every woman is a star.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Pan is not dead; he liveth, Pan!</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Break down the bar!</i></div><br />
Return to the center and turn to face due south, holding your arms out in the shape of a cross. Trace an invoking unicursal hexagram over your heart (hint: it's the same pattern you just walked on the floor) and recite the following:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>To man I come, the number of</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> A man my number, Lion of Light;</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>I am The Beast whose Law is Love.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> Love under will, his royal right—</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Behold within, and not above,</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> One star in sight!</i></div><br />
I always liked to keep open a long time after this for reflection and communication, because you never know exactly how much insight and information you're going to get. It might be hints or visions, or you might have an encyclopedia jammed into your soul all at once (you Adepts out there know what I'm talking about) so above all else, don't try to rush through this ritual. Make sure you have time to really feel it all.<br />
I used this ritual daily for months, and it became a regular part of my opening rituals. I'd say I was getting noticeable results from the start, but continued practice with it produced results beyond anything I'd imagined. As always, I appreciate feedback from anyone else who uses my work and gets results.<br />
<br />
Enjoy!<br />
<br />
<i>In naming this ritual I used the same method Crowley used in naming the Star Ruby and Star Sapphire. In Liber 777, the mineral "rock crystal" is associated with the magical power of attaining Knowledge and Conversation of one's Holy Guardian Angel. It's not a vital piece of information, but it was better than naming it "Wade's Ritual of Angel Awesomeness". I'm sure you agree. </i><br />
<br />
<i>I also shanked his poem "One Star in Sight". It seems to have been written for exactly this sort of thing. </i>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-30000949063927252282011-06-27T00:11:00.001-07:002011-06-27T00:11:42.074-07:00Magical Qualities Part II: A Mage is Truthful<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div><em> "I always tell the truth. Even when I lie."</em> - Tony Montana<br />
<br />
Once upon a time there was a young man, a purveyor of magical items. Magicians came from all around to buy the wonderous creations displayed on his shelves. Oils and tinctures glittered from bottles and jars. Dirts, dusts, powders and compounds filled the air with their pungent odors, adding to the dusty smell of hundreds and hundreds of books. For the practitioners of all magic-using traditions, this was the most powerful place in the city.<br />
It wasn't just the great and powerful who came to buy his magical goodies, either. Ordinary people, run-of-the-mill working class folks, came to purchase their charms and spells to make their lives a little better. Spells to get rid of their neighbors, spells to get so-and-so to date them, spells to pick up a little extra money or get revenge on someone who'd wronged them. For a price, our humble protagonist could lay a curse, take one off, or knock back the person who'd laid it.<br />
Our story begins with Jeanelle, a young woman who had a problem. She lived next door to a small general store, the kind of place where all the kids would hang out. The store itself was a very popular place, but it wasn't actually making a lot of money because it was still just a small neighborhood store. The owner had made several requests to Jeanelle's landlord about buying the house to expand his business, and she came first to the magic shop for help.<br />
Jeanelle's first spell was a shot across his bow. The store began suffering general misfortune over the next few weeks, eventually leading to a break-in which left the store trashed inside. This would normally have been the end of a relatively small business, but less than two weeks later it was open again and doing more business than before. Jeanelle came in for a tarot reading and discovered that the store owner was doing some sort of defensive magic designed to deflect her attacks back on herself. Quickly she purchased defensive spells of her own, and a few more nasty tricks to try and put the store out of business.<br />
This exchange went back and forth for several months, both sides exchanging blows until a van parked next to the store caught fire one night, and both buildings burned almost to the ground. Fortunately nobody was seriously injured, but the store had to close and Jeanelle had to move in with her mother.<br />
When relating this story to his apprentice, the young warlock was careful to point out that nobody ever really "wins" a war - they just lose less. "So ... how was it you were able to predict and counter each spell?", the apprentice asked.<br />
"Well, the store owner was in here to get readings and buy *his* spells too. I was able to give them both exactly what they wanted, because I knew what they were both trying to do to each other."<br />
"But was it ethical for you to be selling spells to both Jeanelle AND the store owner?" the apprentice asked.<br />
"Perfectly ethical, son. Neither of them ever thought to ask for peace."<br />
<br />
Truth is the stock in trade of all the most powerful people. Not so much the telling of it, but the <em>control </em>of it, seeking it out and acquiring it as if it were veins of precious metal. Truth is power. Truth is practically currency. But what sort of friend is truth? Truth is the friend that takes your keys when you've had too much to drink, but it's also the friend that rats you out when you cheat on your girlfriend. Truth can be a real bitch sometimes.<br />
It's easy to think of truth in terms of an abstract substance of some sort, but to phenomenize it in that manner steals focus from its true nature, and therefore from its true power. The world<em> is</em> truth - "truth" is a snapshot of the actual material state of the world, so go get it. Seek it out, hunt it down, make it your own. Whether your objective is to make the truth public, hoard it for yourself, or embellish it to spin the perception in another direction entirely, your first desire should be for the truth.<br />
The biggest problem for a magician who deals in truth is how to tell a lie. Essentially, a spell is a lie you tell the universe. Things are one way, and you tell the universe things are different and if you lie well enough, the universe believes you and makes it happen. So, when a magician tells an ordinary lie there is a strong tendency for it to become truth, because the magician said it was so.<br />
The cure for this is a wonderful term invented by the Catholic Church, called "Mental Reservation". You can speak a direct lie, as long as you correct it by extension in your mind.<br />
<br />
"No honey, of course we won't go to the strip club tonight (mentally adding <em>because if we hurry the sun will still be technically above the horizon</em>)."<br />
<br />
"You know I love you <em>because I've never let on that I don't.</em>"<br />
<br />
"I can't come to work today because I'm sick <em>of dealing with you clowns eight hours a day.</em>"<br />
<br />
Naturally, you can see how each of these three lies might come true if not neutralized by Mental Reservation - the trip to the gentlemen's club might get interrupted any number of ways, the speaker might *actually* fall in love, and the worker might genuinely become ill while playing hooky. Truth is a valuable commodity, so you should be very very careful not to taint it with lies. The best that could happen is that those lies become truth, but the worst that could happen is that the lies take power out of your words, and you lose the ability to do magic by fiat.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-52967346498363919692011-06-13T20:52:00.000-07:002011-06-13T20:58:38.241-07:00Magical Qualities Part I: A Mage is Clever<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div>The war that had lasted for nearly ten years was ending this day.<br />
<br />
The challenge had been laid down, and it was very clear. The two magicians had agreed to meet at a clearing, in the woods near where they both lived. Each of them was allowed to bring witnesses, but no seconds. It didn't matter anymore why they hated each other. This fight was to resolve their differences once and for all.<br />
<br />
Eric chose to have their duel in the clearing, and Simon agreed. It was neutral ground, and very private. Both mages brought witnesses to watch for foul play, and guard against interference, from both magical and mundane sources. Simon brought a standing placard with the rules posted on its face, and they were read out loud by the judge.<br />
<br />
"Two circles will be drawn, nine feet across and nine feet apart.<br />
<br />
Each magician is allowed one magical implement, but it may not be thrown or used to strike his opponent.<br />
<br />
Neither magician will be permitted a protective talisman of any sort.<br />
<br />
Neither magician may set foot outside the circles once the duel begins.<br />
<br />
The duel begins when both magicians enter their circles.<br />
<br />
The duel ends when one magician surrenders or is incapacitated."<br />
<br />
Both magicians agreed to the rules and presented their magical implements for inspection. Eric had brought his rosewood cup, seven inches across with three moonstones set in the stem. Simon brought a staff made from a yew sapling, seven feet long and completely unadorned. Both were inspected by the judge and pronounced suitable for use - neither staff nor cup contained disguised features or hidden weapons. Both were then given to the combatants' apprentices for safekeeping until the duel began.<br />
<br />
After a brief staredown, Eric took the initiative and stepped over to Simon and extended his hand, which Simon left hanging in the air. "So," he muttered. "I want you to know that I never wanted it to come to this. I always thought that no matter what happened, we could manage to stay friends. We've always been friends, ever since we were kids."<br />
<br />
Simon listened without responding, staring off into the distance. Finally he lowered his eyes to the ground, sighed and said "I'm going to kick your ass, Eric." He added as he walked away, "And if I can, I'm going to kill you." Both mages approached their circles and prepared themselves. Eric's apprentice came forward to cleanse him, sprinkling him with blessed water from his cup and lightly misting him with the smoke from a white sage bundle. Simon's apprentice came to him, dipping her fingers in a bowl of black paint and painting a Sign of War on Simon's forehead. This was the moment of truth.<br />
<br />
The judge brought them both forward to the center of the field, directly between the two circles. Standing directly across from the placard, the judge recited the rules one more time for both of them.Then he laid down the law. "The conditions of the duel are clear, and their dispute is considered resolved as of today. The victor resumes his accustomed life, and the defeated mage will be dismissed from the community. Both combatants will now turn and enter their circles, and the duel is begun as of now."<br />
<br />
Without a word, both Eric and Simon turned back to back and stepped into their respective circles, carrying their chosen implements. A tense quiet fell over the clearing as the two mages turned to face each other. Simon was clear and focused, grinning in determination. He took his staff in his left hand, wrapping his right hand around the knobby root on top. Taking a deep breath, he lowered his stance a little and pointed the butt-end of his staff directly forward at Eric's circle.<br />
<br />
Eric, on the other hand, looked calm and peaceful. Passive and expressionless, he sat down cross-legged and began staring into his cup. His breath slowed and his trance deepened as he sought his opponent's heart. Gazing deeper, he began seeing into Simon's mind. Passing through his surface thoughts, he gazed deeper still, seeking to open a gateway into Simon's heart through which he could reach through and compel his surrender. Confident he could end the duel quickly and peacefully, he finally broke through the last of Simon's barriers and saw into his heart.<br />
<br />
<i>Oh no.</i><br />
<br />
Eric's head snapped up in shock and he locked eyes with Simon. Grinning broadly, Simon began charging toward the edge of his circle. Planting the butt end of his staff into the ground right on the line, he swung his legs foward. The staff flexed just enough to add spring to his vault, and he cleared the gap between the circles. Simon's grin never faltered as his boots thumped down inside Eric's circle and he used his forward momentum to launch him forward as he began administering an epic beating to his half-tranced opponent.<br />
<br />
The initial shock of the brutal assault prevented any of Eric's witnesses from a prompt rescue, and by the time the judge got between the two mages, Eric was a bloody unconscious mess. Simon's witnesses pointed out that Eric was indeed the first one unconscious, but Eric's witnesses insisted that Simon be disqualified for breaking the rules.<br />
<br />
The judge only had one question. "Simon, exactly how was that a magical duel?"<br />
<br />
Still grinning, Simon crossed over to the placard in the middle of the pitch. He tore off the piece of paper on which he'd written the rules, revealing a gold sigil painted on the placard. "This is a sigil of coercion, compelling anyone who read what I posted to accept it. This fight was over the minute Eric agreed to abide by a set of rules with a pretty obvious loophole."<br />
<br />
The war was over.<br />
<br />
Moral of the Story: The most powerful things in the world are never what they appear to be. Never hesitate to bend the rules.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-66265043986803213762011-06-04T14:26:00.000-07:002011-06-04T14:26:30.424-07:00Oh look, a butterfly!Okay, we've all been to this particular place. I was working out this morning, and I like to wrap up afterward by "running my chakras", doing a little energy work to redistribute the extra juice I didn't use up during my workout. It really helps restore a certain amount of "normal" to me so I'm not so physically exhausted and mentally overactive at the same time.<br />
<br />
So There I Was, kneeling in the middle of my living room and getting settled in. I figured I'd give my chakras a clean sweep and then see which one felt like getting some attention today, and it turned out to be my throat chakra ( in case you're lost here, I'm doing this post as a lead-in to a series on the chakras without all the new-age bullshit, coming at you over the next few weeks ).<br />
<br />
And the neighbor's dog starts barking.<br />
<br />
And I forgot to turn the music off.<br />
<br />
And sweat was trickling down my neck.<br />
<br />
Nine hundred and fifty distractions.<br />
<br />
Now, I've been doing chakra work for probably twenty years, and this is a pretty common thing. America seems to have adopted a culture of "deficit attention", where we bounce from one thing to the next all day long. I figured out a trick for this ages ago, and I figured it was time to pass it on to other people. I make the distractions work *for* me instead of against me.<br />
<br />
So now I'm breathing into my throat chakra, and in my mind the neighbor's dog is barking at it (strangely enough, it started glowing this weird ultraviolet purple when I added the dog). Then I added the music, and my throat chakra started thumping like a subwoofer (and after a few seconds this became a physical sensation). Then I added the sweat, which in my mind started trickling out of the chakra itself. Every time something in my environment caught my attention, I found a way to add it to my meditation.<br />
<br />
Now everything in my environment that had previously been distracting me was now reinforcing my energy work, producing energy for me instead of drawing it away. Where before I had been an island, I was now in an ocean of power and every wave was taking me where I needed to go. It was a complete reversal of everything traditional chakra work focuses on - instead of isolation I was now fully in the embrace of the world, and it was doing my work for me.<br />
<br />
So there's Uncle Ironbutt's Tips and Tricks for today - make the world support your meditation instead of distracting you from it, and the world is yours.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-701487082558852752011-05-02T22:15:00.000-07:002011-05-02T22:15:09.558-07:00The Magical Legacy of Osama bin Laden<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div><em>"I'm going to do something to you no man should ever do - I'm going to take away your enemy."</em><br />
Mikhail Gorbachev to Ronald Reagan<br />
<br />
Ding dong, the witch is dead? The whole world is abuzz today about the death of Osama bin Laden in a heroic raid by US Navy SEALs. Pictures and video are bandied about. Names get put up on walls. Medals get handed out. Champagne corks fly by the thousands, like some fizzy honor guard. But there is one question nobody's asking.<br />
<br />
What do we do for a Bad Guy now?<br />
<br />
America is a nation of cantankerous bastards. Yes, you too in all likelihood. We thrive on conflict and drama, and why not? Conflict is highly motivational. Nearly all of our greatest technological advances have come from the desire to wage bigger and better wars, to cause greater destruction while protecting ourselves. Our soldiers stroll nonchalantly through mountains of bodies, fording rivers of blood to carry our message to the world: <em>"Don't Fuck With America."</em> By and large, that message comes through loud and clear. We're good.<br />
What keeps us so good? We've had good enemies. There has always been someone we could point to and say "That's the Bad Guy right there." The Russians served as really good Boogeymen for the longest time, and why not? A gigantic empire in the frozen north, populated by muscular giants who always seemed to be just drunk enough to punch out the windshield of your car. Granted, that last bit is partly about the Russian accent but there's a good deal of vodka involved there too. Rocky IV was a very thinly-veiled reference to the plucky underdog United States standing up to, and defeating, the Russian juggernaut simply through sheer force of determination. Never mind that a real-life Ivan Drago would have had to send out search parties to find Rocky's rib cage. It was a good American myth. The Russians were really great adversaries - I kinda miss those days.<br />
After the fall of the Soviet Union, the soul of America needed a new Bad Guy. It couldn't be another empire - we'd toppled the only one left in the world, and that just wasn't scary anymore. We needed something that really acted as a motivator, and we needed to be creative about it because Americans were getting soft again. This time, we wanted an enemy that wasn't a giant unbreakable monolith, but one that was small and numerous like a swarm of bees. A beeswarm is massive but you never seem to be able to hit it, and when you <em>do </em>manage to make a dent it just moves around you and keeps stinging. So we invented the myth of the Terror Cell, creating images of swarthy brown invaders scuttling through our streets, acting like Americans until they decide to strike. In our media and movies the Terror Cells were small and autonomous, and apparently endless in supply. Now, by "myth" I'm not attempting to imply that terrorism isn't real, or that terrorists don't exist. I'm simply pointing out that <em>what we know</em> about terrorism comes to us from the media in the form of a myth. Hell, even the name "Al Qaeda" was a media invention, and now it's a household name!<br />
Now most of our action movies are about terrorism, except that Muslims don't motivate us the same way the Russians did. Fighting the Russians made everyone feel like a soldier, ready to stand up and face the enemy over there. With the new Bad Guy, the fight isn't over there - it's over here. Suddenly we no longer have a safe haven to protect, and even our civilians are warned about the dangers of letting down their guard. The faceless Muslim Threat might be too effective of a Bad Guy.<br />
See, the value of having a really worthy adversary is that it motivates you - everything you DO revolves in some way around getting the drop on the Bad Guy. With the Russians, we knew their Achilles Heel - technology. So we built better smarter weapons and trained better smarter soldiers. Sure, they had more nukes but ours were bigger and better. When you choose an enemy, you should choose one you can beat but not too easily. The Russians could be beaten because they were an empire, a single political entity that could be toppled. Never mind that it collapsed under its own decadence and antique infrastructure - we took the win anyway.<br />
But with the Muslim Terror Cells (and let's face it - when you read the word "terrorist" that's what you think of) there <em>is </em>no single enemy that can be toppled. It's a swarm of bees that stings from all around, nimbly evading any attempt to strike back. Is it a coincidence that Osama bin Laden looks just like the circus guy wearing a beard of bees? Probably, but that image is going to linger awhile.<br />
The point is that Terror Cells actually aren't a good choice of Bad Guy when seeking to motivate your citizens, but it's a <em>great </em>choice if the objective is to keep your citizens so paralyzed with fear that they'll submit to any amount of harsh or invasive treatment. Did we have TSA ball-jugglers during the Red Scare? Hell no - we were SMOKING on airplanes back then! Did we cheerfully submit to roving wiretaps? Nope. There's a lot we wouldn't have put up with when the Russians were the Bad Guys, because they weren't scary enough to scare us. Now, I've simply stopped flying because I refuse to be treated like a terrorist by an organization that hasn't caught a single terrorist yet.<br />
How do we measure up against our Bad Guys? Well, for starters we're not as good as our legend says, but that's beside the point. The use of reputation or authority as a magical tool is well established. It keeps our confidence high while demoralizing enemy troops, and despite what every movie about high school will tell you, a reputation pretty much only comes into existence if it's been rightfully earned. Oh sure, there are plenty of exaggerations around but, in reality, where there's smoke there's fire. The Stoner kid? Yeah, he was actually getting high a lot. The football hero? Yeah, he worked really hard and practiced all the time and made lots of touchdowns. The slutty cheerleader? Yeah.<br />
America started out winning wars right off the bat. We started getting a reputation and a history. Never mind that the White House was burned down by (can you freaking believe it) Canadians. Never mind that we crept up on the British and murdered them in their sleep on Christmas. Never mind that the Heroes of the Alamo were thieves and slave traders who dropped to their knees and begged for mercy at the feet of Santa Anna. Our legend grew, and in turn we became a really really effective Bad Guy for other countries.<br />
What kind of Bad Guy is America? We have several advantages, namely being far enough across the ocean to let our reputation grow over distance. Up close, personal contact with a Bad Guy tends to take away his power, because the oldest and strongest emotion is fear and the oldest and strongest fear is the fear of the unknown. If more of our enemies overseas got to see Americans who <em>weren't</em> shooting them from helicopters, our reputation would probably diminish. If they got to take a tour of Alabama, it would disappear completely.<br />
So we're not only distant, we're huge. We're one of the few Superpowers left in the world, and to an outside observer we're certainly the most invasive. America gets into everyone's business, and starts taking sides. We also have lots of elite military and paramilitary groups who operate with near autonomy, dropping into strike zones and making lots and lots of people dead. Just yesterday, such a group finally took out bin Laden's compound in Pakistan.<br />
America is therefore the ultimate Bad Guy - all the monolithic enormity of the Union Formerly Known as Soviet, with all the bee-swarming unstoppability of the Muslim Terror Cell. We're a big target, but the cost of striking us is too high for most enemies to deal with.<br />
<br />
Now, in case you were starting to wonder about the title, yes there <em>is</em> a magical lesson here. Choose your Bad Guy wisely - and don't bother pretending you don't have one. We all have one. Make sure it's someone or something you can actually do something about, but not one so easily toppled that it's not motivational. We all need an adversary now and then, a whipping boy for when we're riding high and a boogeyman for when we're slacking off. Without an enemy, we tend to get complacent and then soft. Enemies provide an excellent workout, even if you don't actually intend to hurt anyone.<br />
Remember the work of the Dagger - the act of creation consists of defining something by what it is not, but taking that chunk of cloth and slicing away everything that isn't a shirt. When we choose our Bad Guy, the wise choice is to find an enemy that espouses (or can be assumed to espouse) all the characteristics we do not want in ourselves. It doesn't matter if our new enemy actually <em>is </em>all those things or not - the enemy is merely a symbol, our personal Choronzon, and until it comes time to Cross the Abyss every magician is going to find it very handy to have an anti-Self to brace against. So choose wisely - your choice of enemy also defines yourself.<br />
Also take care to choose wisely what kind of Bad Guy <em>you</em> are. Naturally in our own mythoi, we're the Good Guys but to everyone else we represent the things they aren't, and since they're the Good Guys ... guess what you are. Be sure to play to your strengths - the last thing you want is to fashion your adversary-self as something easily exposed as a sham. Beware of giving away too much information about yourself - the less they know, the more details they have to invent (and they <em>will </em>invent them!)<br />
Summing up, Osama bin Laden may well have been the perfect boogeyman - reclusive, mobile, almost ghostlike in his ability to disappear and reappear elsewhere, and in command of his own swarm of bees. That particular queen bee is dead, but his legacy lingers on for those willing to take a lesson from history. Remember that it's especially important to be absent from time to time, to let the memory of you grow larger. Even in death, your legend will linger on.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-22027457998762846942011-04-15T21:15:00.000-07:002011-04-15T21:15:51.646-07:00On "Thelema" (How I learned to stop worrying and love my True Will)<strong>"Do what thou Wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Love is the Law, Love under Will."</strong><br />
<br />
Seldom since Biblical times has a more misinterpreted set of words been written. Purportedly originating with Francois Rabelais, the notion of "Thelema" as a philosophy was ideally intended to create an atmosphere of complete freedom and leisure, with no rules or restrictions on their behavior in any way. Rabelais believed that, free from restrictions or responsibilities, mankind would naturally devote its efforts solely to the most productive advancements of the human race.<br />
<br />
<em> Rabelais had never seen an X Box.</em><br />
<em></em><br />
<br />
Crowley's take on Thelema was somewhat different - that every man and woman was born with an inmost nature not necessarily unique in structure, but unique to the individual. While Crowley was quite clear about how important it was for a person to first know and then perform their "True Will", he gave almost no instruction whatsoever on how a person was expected to perform that first critical step, to recognize and understand exactly what it is they're designed to do.<br />
Consequently, there has been a lot of very large talk about what is and isn't a person's "True Will". In my time among the Thelemites, I've heard everything from drug abuse and sexual manipulation to outright theft (among other crimes) justified with a casual "You can't stop me - it's my True Will.", despite Crowley's many admonitions that a person's True Will would not normally place them in conflict with the liberties or free expression of another's Will.<br />
So what IS a person's True Will? How do you know what you're supposed to do? Crowley was rather vague on several points regarding this, but he was uncommonly clear in Liber Thisharb regarding the recognition of one's True Will. After much gobbledygook involving talking and writing backwards and unnecessary attempts at past-life regression, he comes right to the point:<br />
<br />
<em>"Suppose, having lived all my life among savages, a ship is cast upon the shore and wrecked. Undamaged among the cargo is a "Victoria." What is its use? The wheels speak of roads, their slimness of smooth roads, the brake of hilly roads. The shafts show that it was meant to be drawn by an animal, their height and length suggest an animal of the size of a horse. That the carriage is open suggests a climate tolerable at any rate for part of the year. The height of the box suggest crowded streets, or the spirited character of the animal employed to draw it. The cushions indicate its use to convey men rather than merchandise; its hood that rain sometimes falls, or that the sun is at times powerful. The springs would imply considerable skill in metals; the varnish much attainment in that craft."</em><br />
<br />
The metaphor is nearly perfect, the logic inescapable. YOU are the wagon, and even a quick self-analysis will narrow down possible answers quickly. Physical traits may reveal useful information, but this exercise is more about mental and spiritual tendencies. Are you a builder? Are you a healer? Can you look at a situation and immediately correct all the flaws? Can you step between two arguing parties and bring them to a mutual resolution? Can you pick up a musical instrument and play a passable tune? These will all be clues to your True Will.<br />
It's usually not as specific as many people make it out to be. Typically, a person might wonder if it's his True Will to be a carpenter or bricklayer, but they're both the same type of occupation - building. Some people are builders, and some people are wreckers. After all, if nothing ever got wrecked, where do we build stuff? Some Wills are agents of the mundane, working in acts of creation, preservation, improvement, or destruction. Other Wills are agents of enchantment, using art, music, theater, poetry or speech to command the hearts of their audience. Still others are agents of science, using analysis, invention, physics and mechanics to create, repair and make use of new physical or magical technologies. This list is hardly exhaustive, but it should give you an idea of the variety of Wills in the human race. It helps to think of the universe as a giant machine, and each sentient being an operative element within that machine.<br />
I've also heard a lot of talk about True Will in terms of fairly base biological imperatives, such as having sex or raising children. These are nothing more than physical impulses, ours only by virtue of wearing the meat suit for another round of incarnation - we ALL have the same instincts to preserve the species and maintain our physical bodies. Claiming it's a person's True Will to raise children is like saying the reason for building cars is to keep our junkyards full. Likewise with having sex - our species puts way too much emphasis on who does and doesn't do whatever with their naughty bits, but in the big picture who really cares? Look at it from the point of view of a creator - if you had a petri dish with an experimental strain of bacteria in it, do you <em>honestly </em>care which ones are bumping up against the others, or how they're doing the bumping?<br />
<br />
<strong>SO WAIT, WHAT NOW?</strong><br />
<br />
Okay, so we've covered a bit more about Thelema and the actual nature of True Will, and you know a little bit more about what you can reasonably expect to discover about yourself. What do you do with this knowledge? Well, to be perfectly honest, a large percentage of the human race is already happily going about their business <em>doing </em>their True Will already, without ritual, without fanfare, without initiations or ceremonies or lofty titles. The difference is that many of them are not doing it consciously. They're also doing it the hard way.<br />
Why do anything the hard way? We're magicians! I strongly suggest that before you even attempt to discover your True Will, you do your level best to acquire power. True power, the kind that comes from years of study and especially practice. Are you the kind of magician who can perform from memory all of Crowley's pentagram rituals, but can't cast a simple spell? Can you perform the greater and supreme pentagram rituals invoking water, yet you choke on a rain spell? Fix that!<br />
Cast spells! Get some actual hours in behind the altar. Mix it up a little. Don't be afraid to meddle in the affairs of mortals, either. I hear lots of excuses for not doing magic and after thirty years of study, practice and training apprentices I can safely say that most people who quit magic don't quit when they fail. They quit when they succeed.<br />
<br />
<strong>WHY?</strong><br />
<br />
Logically, human beings expect magic to fail. It doesn't fit with their established worldview. However, <em>success</em> requires a person completely rearrange their understanding of how the world works, and that process sucks. There's also the unspoken injunction that when we DO accept that magic is real and we can control it, that we are supposed to do the responsible thing and use it for positive purposes. That's a lot of pressure, and a lot of uncharted territory we have to map out alone. Responsibility is a heavy burden, and it's scary to think that our neat little ordered world is nothing more than a comforting illusion.<br />
But guess what? The hard part's over, because you just realized that. Time to get to work.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-40750474523558485782011-04-02T17:50:00.003-07:002011-04-02T17:50:49.581-07:00On Being the Ill Wind<em>Tis an yll wynde that blowth no man to good, men say."</em> - English proverb<br />
<br />
"Times" have always been hard, and those hardest hit have always made a lot of talk about who's to blame - specifically going so far as to paint them "evil", naturally positing themselves as "good" by comparison. Without going into too great a detail about the American state of absolute blamelessness and unaccountability, I'd like to take the conversation in an entirely different direction.<br />
Poor people have always blamed their woes on the rich, and it's pretty common to hear that all a person's problems would be solved "if I had X amount of money". This is why the lottery stays in business, because when a person finds themselves at a disadvantage because of a specific lack, in their mind the resource they lack becomes a magical cure-all for everything wrong with their life.<br />
Rich people have the same problem. A recent <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2011/03/14/millionaires-need-7-5-million-to-feel-wealthy/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2011/03/14/millionaires-need-7-5-million-to-feel-wealthy/">article in the Wall Street Journal</a> stated that America's wealthiest people wouldn't actually consider themselves "rich" unless they had a net worth of at least $7.5 million. Most Americans wouldn't even know what to do with that amount of money, at least from their current perspective.<br />
Which brings us around to the subject of today's food for thought. The vast majority of what people have always labeled "evil" is almost entirely a matter of perspective. Events like the American Civil War and World War II have commonly become spun up into tales of Good's epic quest to vanquish Evil, but that's fairly common with revisionist history. It's common knowledge that Operation Desert Storm was so that the American White Knight could liberate the poor beleaguered nation of Kuwait from the evil Iraqi invaders, but it's also UNcommon knowledge that the White House had previously <a href="http://www.representativepress.org/LiesAboutIraq.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://www.representativepress.org/LiesAboutIraq.html">stated it had no resistance to Iraq reclaiming Kuwait</a> (Kuwait had been part of Iraq until a British treaty declared them a sovereign emirate), much as the United States had offered no resistance to Nazi Germany reclaiming countries within the borders of Old Germany (the Holy Roman Empire in Europe). We conveniently forget the truth in favor of a lie which justifies our prejudices.<br />
<br />
<strong>EVIL</strong><br />
<br />
When we describe something as Evil, what are we actually saying? What IS Evil in our world? Naturally, the actual criteria which qualifies a person or event as Evil varies from person to person, but it tends to find its greatest utility of definition in the qualities where we find ourselves most disadvantaged. For the poor, Evil is rich people. For the rich, Evil is the government and legislation that forces them to pay the bulk of taxes in America. For the Pagan, Evil is the Christian religion that persecuted them since Christianity was brand new. For the Christian, Evil is the Islamic religion that seeks to replace them as God's favorite son. For the Muslim, Evil is the Great Satan that constantly interferes in their internal affairs in the Middle East and around the world. For men, Evil is the woman who seduces and uses them, spending the man's hard-earned money and leaving with half his stuff when he's broke. For women, Evil is the man who breaks promises and uses them for sex, beating and raping the woman when she doesn't behave.<br />
Evil is always the Other Guy. Evil is never us.<br />
So if Evil is such a subjective term, does it even have any use today? Probably not in its current form. However, if we examine the root characteristics of everything currently labeled "Evil", we might be able to reclaim both the labels "Good" and "Evil" and actually use them productively, even though this requires accepting certain truths about ourselves which we might find uncomfortable. "Wizards of the Coast", the company that owns and produces the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons, offers a novelty <a href="http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20001222b" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20001222b">online Alignment Test</a> for those players who are uncertain as to which alignment their character would be, based on honest descriptions of their actions. Naturally, it's a gaming aid and not some sort of moral pronouncement judging a person's soul, but it's the kind of honest introspection a practical magic-using person should engage in periodically.<br />
Now, I'm hardly one to sit here preaching to people that they should "be good for goodness' sake", but I strongly recommend against defying one's inmost nature. The point is that we all have our moments. We'd all like to think of ourselves as "good" people, with a vast preponderance of good actions outweighing anything bad we do. And the few things we do which we actually consider "bad", we have plenty of justification for. So does everyone else.<br />
<br />
<strong>THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE SELFISH</strong><br />
<br />
Basically, it comes down to self-interest. Everything we do, we do for an apparent "good", for some overall purpose which is of benefit to ourselves and our interests. Even the most altruistic gestures are often done just to boost a person's self-esteem, so they can think of themselves as a "good person". Maybe it's not that obvious, though. Each and every one of us was raised with a more or less well-defined code of conduct, and when we follow that code of conduct we feel "right". When we deviate from it, for whatever reason, we feel "wrong" and when we feel "wrong" we have to find some way to ameliorate our guilt.<br />
Since nearly everything we do is motivated by some degree of self-interest, this process of amelioration is usually pretty cut-and-dried. Kenny robbed that convenience store because he lost his job and needed money to meet his financial obligations. Colleen cheated on her husband because she found out her engagement ring was cubic zirconia, and she felt he didn't value her love as much as he'd led her to believe. James was violent and abusive toward his live-in girlfriend's children because they made him feel as if her ex-husband was somehow invading James' home.<br />
We all have reasons for the things we do, both good and bad. However, while we generally accept the reasoning behind our own actions, we seldom feel satisfied accepting the reasoning behind the actions of others. Oh, Kenny *says* he robbed that store so he could pay his rent, but I bet him mom really pays his rent and he just wanted to party and buy drugs, or he probably owed money to someone who wanted it back right away. Everyone knows James is just a jerk who drinks too much, and Colleen's just a whore. THAT'S the motivation we assign to their actions.<br />
Why?<br />
We find their actions unpleasant to think about, or even repugnant, and we're uncomfortable with the possibility that they might have had justified or even compelling reasons for doing what they did. We seldom look at the circumstances of a person doing something horrific, and accept that we ourselves might have done the same thing. This is why the bad guys in movies always commit crimes out of "pure" evil, simple greed or <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Knight_%28film%29" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Knight_%28film%29">just because they're insane</a>. Are we more comfortable with "flat" characters, because we don't like the idea of "bad" people <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man_3" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" title="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man_3">being just like us</a>? Would that mean that, in the right circumstances, we ourselves would become "bad" people with no regrets?<br />
<br />
<strong>THREE SIDES TO EVERY STORY</strong><br />
<br />
We've all been there - a couple we know has a particularly nasty breakup and we spend the next few weeks listening to their tale of woe. It's not often that we get to hear both sides of the story, though. They say there are two sides to every story, but there are actually three. There's his side, her side, and the truth. This is not to say that they're automatically lying about what happened, but they're viewing it from their own personal perspective, running each event and grievance through the filter of what does and doesn't benefit them personally. All too often, molehills turn into mountains and the emotional reactions snowball into a crisis over nothing.<br />
Likewise with "Evil". We, all of us, every single human being throughout history, has done what they did because it seemed like the best option available at the time. That's their side. As an outsider not party to that perspective, however, we often take the liberty of assigning to the action whatever motive best suits our personal agenda. That's our side. The TRUTH is often very different from either party's perspective.<br />
Nobody likes to be put at a disadvantage, or have something taken from them, so when power or materials shift from the control of one party to the control of another, there's blame involved. Maybe your landlord raised your rent a significant amount, and it's automatically assumed to have been done out of greed. Naturally, the landlord doesn't think so or he wouldn't have risked losing your tenancy over it. The TRUTH might be very different though, and maybe the rent increase was absolutely necessary to cover some new expense or make vital repairs to the building, without which there would be a steady decrease in habitability. It may be difficult to accept, but a great deal of what we label as "Evil" is completely justifiable by our own standards, even if it hurts.<br />
<br />
<strong>EVIL MAGIC?</strong><br />
<br />
I've heard a lot of very large talk about "Evil Magic" and the "Threefold Law" in my time, and there always seems to be a lot of freedom to assign blame or wicked motivation to specific individuals, or entire traditions. The British press denounced Aleister Crowley as "The Wickedest Man in the World", and that assessment lingers today, due in no small part to Crowley's love of perpetuating the controversy. Other traditions also take delight in attaching that assessment to the various traditions Crowley was associated with.<br />
So what is the personal benefit in this behavior? It provides personal comfort to be able to point at the practitioners of another magic-using tradition and say "Look there. THOSE are the evil ones, not us." If there is any doubt about this, try asking a Wiccan if they sacrifice animals. Instantly comes the conditioned response about Satanism, and how "THAT isn't US. Look over THERE."<br />
And why is this behavior even necessary? Because of still other traditions whose religious dogma teaches that all magic-using traditions are automatically "Evil". Their various holy books instruct them to persecute all practice of the magical arts, to harass, convert or even execute magic-using people. Then again, their spiritual paradigm rests on the idea that there is eternal punishment for not participating, and in their reality even the Witch Hunts of 1666 were not only justified as a holy commandment, but of great spiritual benefit to its victims because it "saved" them from their "sins".<br />
<br />
<strong>CONCLUSION</strong><br />
<br />
So ... what do we do now? What do we do with what we learned? Did we even learn anything? Probably not. People love their prejudices, because they make us feel comfortable with ourselves. Are you Evil? Maybe. Is that wrong? Probably not.<br />
We all have to be true to our own natures. Some people are very ambitious and focused on personal gain and the advancement of their own agendas. If you are one of these people, accept that about yourself and move on. Some people are similarly ambitious and focused on distributing the rewards of their efforts to those less ambitious than themselves. Some would say these people are different from the first group, but that would be wrong. Both types of people are simply fulfilling their personal agendas. No matter what the fruits of their labor, good or bad, helping or hurting, THEY personally benefit.<br />
So what's Evil? Is it about being selfish to the point of entirely disregarding the effect on others? Or is it simply being practical? They say it takes all kinds of people to make a world, and there's no reason that shouldn't apply to the magical community as well.<br />
So live your life unrestricted. Live your life in Truth. Keep your heart unencumbered by moral judgments, your own and those of others. Indulge yourself and really push your Will into the world. Do not concern yourself with the benefits others reap from your efforts, only your own. You'll be given a variety of labels for this, but success is all the proof you need. People will say you're evil. To hell with them. Others will say you're good. To hell with them too.<br />
<br />
<em>"What you lookin' at? You all a bunch of fuckin' assholes. You know why? You don't have the guts to be what you wanna be. You need people like me. You need people like me so you can point your fuckin' fingers and say, "That the bad guy." So...what that make you? Good? You're not good. You just know how to hide--how to lie. Me, I don't have that problem. Me, I always tell the truth. Even when I lie. So say goodnight to the bad guy!"</em> - Tony MontanaWadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-72135674827434269272011-04-02T17:50:00.001-07:002011-04-02T17:50:10.066-07:00Lingo of Lineage, Lineage of Lingo"Oh my" she giggled happily. "This is straight out of the Gardnerian Book of Shadows!"<br />
<br />
We were reading over a ritual we were planning to attend the following evening, and since I had been to plenty of them and she never had, I wanted to show her the ritual script so she could be duly prepared for what was going to happen. I was somewhat taken by surprise at her reaction, however, and it sparked a discussion that actually came close to becoming quite heated before I showed her the date on the ritual.<br />
<br />
1913.<br />
<br />
Just shy of fifty years before the Gardnerian Book of Shadows existed.<br />
<br />
Still, this hasn't deterred people from claiming that Crowley somehow traveled forward in time to steal material from Gardner, or from claiming that there was some ancient source Gardner had acquired when he was a wee tot, and Crowley stole it from him at the turn of the century, and Gardner kept the whole thing quiet for the next fifty years.<br />
<br />
For some reason, these arguments always seem to hinge on the implication that Gardnerian Witchcraft means nothing if some of the incantations were taken from another source. Of course, this is patently ridiculous. Practically everyone who has accomplished *anything* in the world has done so by standing on the shoulders of giants. Crowley once famously used a verse out of "Greenland's Icy Mountains" at the peak of a ritual, winging it to put himself over the top. There was no outcy denouncing Reginal Heber as a thief or copycat. It was well known that those words came from another source. The important thing is that it worked.<br />
<br />
I'm always vaguely amused by the notion that one particular tradition or (oh god) lineage somehow "owns" magic, or has some controlling stake in it. A few years back, I read an article from someone who had managed to acquire at auction Gardner's original OTO charter, signed and given to him by Crowley himself to open an OTO body in his area. He took this as license to imply that he now controlled the lineage of Gardnerian Witchcraft itself, and was "calling in their charter". Apparently, witches were supposed to start paying dues or stop practicing magic. Yeah.<br />
<br />
Nobody owns magic. Arguing over who owns magic is like two fleas arguing over which of them makes the dog hair grow - both are wrong and the dog hardly knows they're even there. Magic is a force of nature, and to a certain extent *all* rituals are false because they don't tap directly into magic itself. Ritual is a psychological device to bypass the brain's mental censor and access magic indirectly. Wax on, wax off, Daniel-san.<br />
<br />
A couple weeks ago, I read a blog from a wiccan who had just returned from PantheaCon and was waxing vehement about all the "stolen wiccan ritual" she'd witnessed there. She went on at great length how people "dared" to call the quarters, work in circles, use the word "priestess" and work with deities, all without acknowledging that these practices are somehow "owned by Wicca". I could not think of anything more ridiculous, and I pointed this out to her and was promptly banned for not acknowledging that all forms of magic came from Wicca.<br />
<br />
Whatever.<br />
<br />
All the things she was complaining about, every single ritual element she mentioned, have been used in magic since the dawn of time. Magic-using cultures have *always* acknowledged the power of the four directions and elements, have *always* worked in circles, have *always* called on gods and goddesses. Perhaps someone should notify the druids of Stonehenge that they'd better start writing royalty checks to Silver Ravenwolf? There are so many traditional rituals that resemble Wiccan rituals, not because they stole those elements from Wicca, but precisely the other way around. Wicca as a tradition was assembled from many other Western magic-using traditions, so it's only natural that there will be a lot of prima facie resemblance. By extension, those same Western magic-using traditions were descended from even older traditions, so if one were to look *only* at isolated elements of ritual it would be incredibly easy to point out ancient sources and claim direct lineage to those traditions.<br />
<br />
Pretty much every tradition that exists today, and I'm in a position to know, is built on the foundations of earlier practices. Arguing about who "invented" the idea of gods and goddesses is asinine. Is a person's magic somehow less effective if they forget to put the trademark logo on their pentagram? Of course not. I was present when the owner of the store where I worked received a copyright notice in the mail, that she was to immediately stop using the store's logo because a new pagan band had just trademarked it. We all had a good laugh and ignored the notice completely.<br />
<br />
Perhaps the issue is about credibility? Is a tradition somehow "suspect" if its rituals came from questionable sources? I must answer with a single word "Pseudonomicon". Here's a tradition of magic that was taken wholly from the ostensibly fictional writings of H.P. Lovecraft, dealing with ancient gods and cosmic forces at play upon the Earth. There was never any serious evidence showing the stories were anything more than fictional, and yet that system of magic works.<br />
<br />
Why?<br />
<br />
Because, as I said before, ritual is not magic. Ritual is a device used to trick our minds into doing magic indirectly. It doesn't matter who wrote the specific lines of ritual, any more than Christian Dior has to credit all his work to Edmund Cartwright for inventing the steam loom. What matters is what gets done with the technology TODAY.<br />
<br />
It's a great shame that person had to miss out on all the beauty and power of PantheaCon because she was obsessing over who stole "her" tradition.<br />
<br />
Which brings me to the closing thoughts - are you doing magic to get things done? Or are you simply doing it for credit? Are you the kind of magician who loudly trumpets what they're about to do, so they can receive all the attention and praise for their powers, or are you quietly and diligently working to make the world a better place for you to get things done?<br />
<br />
Don't lie. You're a little of both. So am I.<br />
<br />
THAT you can own.Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-29570684014353471342011-04-02T17:49:00.002-07:002011-04-02T17:49:39.167-07:00"Nature's Nobility": A look at Witch Blood and what it means to have it<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div>There's always been talk about Witch Blood. Many people claim to have been "born a witch" or to have acquired their magic naturally. Then, of course, we have the whole Harry Potter phenomenon, with the concept of "Wizarding families" and "Purebloods" vs "Mudbloods" and of course "Muggles" - people who are born without magic. Is it true? Is it even partly true? Yes and no.<br />
<br />
Magic isn't something you're born with. Magical *potential* is something you're born with. Just like athletic potential, magical potential exists in greater or lesser amounts in every human being, and just like athletic potential it's mostly determined by your lineage and upbringing.<br />
<br />
Arnold Schwartzenegger was born with athletic potential, but it took years and years of hard work and dedication to make anything of himself. He probably wouldn't have been Conan without that inborn potential. Then again, he wouldn't have been *anything* without those years of work and dedication.<br />
<br />
I have the Blood on my father's side of the family, but there hasn't been any tradition to inform it for generations so most of that potential never manifested beyond natural tendencies. Having studied the works of Gregor Mendel, I could make a reasonable guess that, out of myself and my three siblings one of us would be full-blooded, two would be half-blooded and one would be a "Squib" (to borrow Rowling's term for a non-magical child born into a magical family). However, as it turns out only two of us seem to have developed any magical ability, so if there's a geneticist in the house please feel free to correct me.<br />
<br />
Don't get me wrong - anyone can use magic. Anyone at all. It's a skillset obtainable by anyone capable of imagination and understanding symbolism. Anyone can pick up a weight set and do some bench presses too, but not everyone's going to develop a 56 inch chest full of raw hamsteak. Magical ability is only partly about being born with potential - even being born into a family with zero magical history, hard work and dedication will make a much better magician than someone with infinite potential who just plays to their natural abilities and makes no effort to develop themselves.<br />
<br />
How do you know if you were born with Witch Blood? Well, chances are if you're reading this you developed an interest in magic at an early age. Did it happen spontaneously? Did you seek it out, or did someone introduce you to it? In short, did the interest come to you unbidden? That's a strong indicator. Magic isn't a logical thing to "just think up one day".<br />
<br />
Did strange things happen around you during puberty? Did objects move around the house or disappear? Did you find things happening just because you wanted them to? Did you have a strange effect on animals or the weather? These are also pretty strong indicators.<br />
<br />
Maybe you were born with the blood, and maybe you weren't. Don't let either case stop you from working toward developing yourself, however - even if you were born without a drop of Witch Blood and you've had to slave away for every tiny step forward, that's one less step your children will have to make. Again, like athletic potential, magical potential can be increased in children by the state of the parents' fitness, as well as their habits around the house. If a child grows up in a magical household, he or she will be much more natural with it and it will get stronger with each new generation. My vision is of a magical world, where every human being has and expresses at least *some* degree of magical ability in their daily lives, and magic has become as pervasive as the internet. If we work on our development, and keep in mind the legacy we pass on to our children, this vision can be a reality.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7547043541634652898.post-50861858512304872102011-04-02T17:49:00.000-07:002011-04-02T17:49:03.531-07:00On Aging<div class="mbl notesBlogText clearfix"><div>Oh my god, do you remember how powerful you used to be? How everyone loved you, or hated you, but never ignored you? Remember how your life used to be neck deep in epic adventures, and everything was incredible?<br />
<br />
And now you're old.<br />
<br />
Everything is greyish and clammy. Your hot and cold have become tepid. Life is full of tolerable comforts and quiet desperation now, and you long for the Good Old Days when colors were bright and the earth shook when you walked.<br />
<br />
Or is it really so?<br />
<br />
Has your fire really gone out? When you were young your fires burnt so hot and bright that everything you touched glowed with passion, but now it seems your fires barely light the walls, let alone warm them. Is that gloom seeping into your bones the cause of your depression, or the effect of it?<br />
<br />
When you were young. Let's start with that. Youth has the benefit of very thick and heavy blinders that provide focus but also block out most of what's going on around you. When you were young, your world was very small. Your world consisted of you. Then there was a small circle around you, a circle of minor concerns such as friends and social dynamics. Your job was a minor inconvenience, something you went and donated face time to in order to keep the rent paid. Like it or not, your world was very small when you were young.<br />
<br />
Let's go back further, to when you were a child. Mom and Dad took care of everything. You were fed. You had a house. You had toys and clothes and all these things were just there for you, and you could take for granted that there would always be provisions available. YOUR concerns were playing and reading, and trying to figure out where your favorite toy went. Your world was practically microscopic.<br />
<br />
When you were a child, there was nothing in your world you couldn't interact with. This is the way you remember it, but your memory is limited to what you could personally experience. Maybe you remember seeing something on teevee about the Iran Hostage Crisis, but you saw lots of things on teevee. That was just teevee. It wasn't part of YOUR world. Your world ended at the edge of your yard, and it was all yours.<br />
<br />
You're older now, and it seems that your power has diminished, that your fire has practically gone out. Yet this is only a matter of perspective. When you were young, your fire only had to provide light and warmth for a single room, but now you have a whole house to fill and sometimes the cold and dark places make you feel as if you're just not up to the task anymore. You simply don't have enough fire to fill your world, not because your fire has gone out but because your world is so much larger than it once was.<br />
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When the darkness creeps in from the corners of your life, it's time to draw your world back to that one room. To remember what's really important in your life. Draw your world back to that one room, and you'll see that your fire is nowhere near close to going out. If anything, it's hotter and brighter than ever before. If you live in YOUR room, minding your own business and not wasting your fire everywhere else, you'll find you have more than enough heat and light to accomplish anything, and sometimes you even need to open a door and let your fire out so it doesn't burn you up.</div></div>Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03579689980092895055noreply@blogger.com0