The conversations going on here and at other sites lately have really been awesome. Seem to actually be getting better all the time. I don’t know where any of it’s going, but I’m definitely into it. I got a couple comments on my “reality as meaning” post that I’d like to promote to the big leagues. This isn’t the order they go in or the full comment, but it’s enough to pick up the thread and run with it.
Laura Jane started it:
if you look at all the spiritual self-help propaganda, most of it essentially tells us that we should be spending all this time meditating and doing guided imagery and keeping journals… so that maybe one day we’ll become enlightened and THEN we’ll be able to start DOING stuff to help other people.
Slomo offered some great additional thoughts:
Well, there is a vested interest in making sure people stay tuned into their own personal vanity and greed. Meanwhile, while we’re all down here decoding our personal oracles to unscramble the numbers of that winning lottery ticket, the powers-that-be up there are busy manifesting their much more powerful and all-encompassing reality
Seems like this a great dissection of the pop culture New Age phenomenon, and under that umbrella I’ll also throw conspiracy, occultism, magick and pop spirituality and whatever else fits (to some extent anyway). Here’s a good example of how this works out in society, in relation to the comments above: I read last year around the election about a group of “witches” who were putting together some kind of “magickal working”. I forget what the actual stated purpose of it was, but it was basically designed to get Bush out of office, or something like that.
Now, I don’t know what’s funnier: the idea you could get Bush out of office by invoking the spirit of the Moon Goddess, or the more culturally-acceptable notion that you could get him out by participating in a civic ritual where you pull a lever to invoke Lady Liberty. At least maybe with the witchcraft you might get naked and hold hands or be around a bonfire - that is, if you’re smart. You might even feel like an honest-to-god Mage. But just think about the self-satisfaction of the noble Citizen who pulled a lever and “made their voice heard.” Who’s more magical? Which experience is less mediated, more direct? Get rid of the nude witch-on-witch action and they seem about equal to me.
Which brings me back to this thing about the occult acting as an endless system of shells. When you as a magician (either civic or psychic) tell me that magick is “centered around actually doing things”, what exactly are those things? Are they rituals designed to bring you love? Here’s something more challenging: go actually talk to a woman and have a real relationship. Or is that going to ruin your spell-casting schedule? Is the ritual supposed to bring you success in business? Here’s something you can try for a laugh: get rid of the notion that you need money to be happy or to be successful. Cut yourself out of the vicious cycle of financial desire and reward. That’s a real fucking mystical discipline if there ever was one. Find out who you are outside of what catalog items you long for.
Or maybe you’re one of those superstitious/supernatural types who voted last year or engaged in some equally arcane ritual to overthrow despotism. Did it work? No? Well, we’ll get ‘em in four years right? The Tarot cards said so. In the meantime, we’ll raise our own “level of consciousness”, and we’ll raise other people’s “awareness”, and everything will work out. It sure feels good to be so magical.
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i’ve never been able to do the ritual thing. i have a hard time believing in it — which is not to say i don’t think it’s potentially valid, it’s just that it feels pretty hollow for me personally. maybe it’s 100% an intention issue. i don’t really know.
i think the most mystical magical thing in the world is human communication/connection. it seems like a lot of people get really caught up in the “practice” and they end up stopping communicating.. at which point you’ve sort of turned into a robot. how convenient for the archons.
Yeah, I don’t know whether or not magickal rituals are invalid. I don’t do them so it’s not really my business. I do know that the time spent doing them might be put to better use taking direct action on this plane, rather than on another.
right exactly. it seems like a circuitous route.
i wonder if people who are really into ritual magick would argue that doing things on THIS plane is actually more of an “energetic detour” ? are rituals supposed to be in some way energy-efficient ?
from a ‘conspiracy’ perspective, i am leaning toward the view that if there really is a government plot to promote new age horse shit, the intention is not to de-spiritualize people but to neutralize dissent and deflect the possibility of meaningful political action. i suspect that with some exceptions, pentagon scriptwriters are machiavellian realists who share marx’s assesment that religion is the opiate of the masses, except they evaluate it differently - hell, these people are opium dealers.
albion, i could definitely agree with that. it does seem that these assholes are less concerned with the “content” or the quality of what the people are experiencing, and MORE concerned with whether it reinforces SOME FORM OF ignorance, passivity, narrow-mindedness, defeatism, whatever.
the notion that it’s possible to just dream your troubles away without engaging in any real substantive activity is pretty disempowering. i don’t think they care which particular thought-trap you get stuck in, as long as you’re stuck in one of them.
though-traps…..good description of a spiritual jail. much like the g8 snafu that`s going on now. punk bands hopping around in front of images of putin and the boys, just in case you were wondering who all the old dudes were, they weren`t members of stings immediate family. they are members of the world elite. the ubercouncil. the new boss……..same as the old boss………..for a new cohort of socially-conscious voters.
In my experience, any form of focused intention (ranging from ritual magick to disciplined affirmations) does work, if followed up by real-world activity. I see it as a lens for focusing energy, nothing more or less. So, yes, in some ways it is energy efficient.
The problem is, it doesn’t always work the way you expect it to. It doesn’t create shortcuts, it just greases the wheels, and if you were already driving in the wrong direction you’ll just get there faster.
When I was spiritually less mature, I often wondered whether a ritual to remove a despot could work. Even so I had the sense not to try anything; something held me back. I now know what the danger is: an assumption that the despots were not already onto magic and had not thoroughly developed their own firepower. I don’t know that the occult workings of modern governments are as well-developed and organized as Jeff Wells speculates, but there is definitely an infrastructure in place.
More importantly, it’s profoundly solipsistic to assume that your little magical powers can change the course of history and the world. It’s hubris. It’s not for us as individuals to decide.
Magic is a useful tool if approached carefully, with a very well-developed awareness of how the world works, and a sense of karma/balance and a very disciplined morality. Even then, it should be done cautiously. I don’t use it much. When I do, I consider very carefully every angle before proceding, and if it involves another person I get permission from that person first.
If you want to mix magic and politics and stay on this side of “righteousness”, I would suggest you use it to help focus your talents in this world (e.g. to help you become a better writer, a better organizer, etc.). Seemingly more direct applications of magic range from being a waste of time to being outright dangerous.
I think that’s an excellent distinction you make slomo, about the need to follow-up a ritual act with a real world equivalent, and how the ritual focuses your intentions for action in this world. I also really like what you said about how when you do that the ritual is going to sort of fast-forward you down whatever track you’re already on, and if you’re on the wrong one, then there you have it.
I don’t mean to knock ritual altogether, as I think it’s useful outside of a “magickal” perspective as well. It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book that allows us to internalize a story in a way that simply hearing it could never do.
I guess my criticism in this piece is not so much ritual as it is about getting caught up in all the clap-trap and missing out on what’s real and what’s important. That happens just as much outside of ritual settings as it does inside I’m sure.
i’ve never been able to do the ritual thing. i have a hard time believing in it —
It’s actually inherently practical; you don’t have to “believe” in it. It becolmes self evident.
(Aside to Tim- ‘ritual magick’ isn’t really applicable to love, money, etc. There may be people who go that route, but that’s not what RM was created for. It’s go a theurgic purpose..in short, like sticking your finger in the cosmic light socket. The “dressing up” is ritual drama, stage dressing to frame story. However, it’s not about play, and ‘playing’ in this sense can be very dangerous- starting with screwing around with entities of unknown iontention all the way to experiencing ego-dissolution without guidance, which has landed a few folks in serious trouble- and I can’t emphasize that enough. (and this ‘pop magic’ bullshit is the worst, like giving gasoline and matches to children. There’s a reason this is an initiatory tradition.)
i wonder if people who are really into ritual magick would argue that doing things on THIS plane is actually more of an “energetic detour†? are rituals supposed to be in some way energy-efficient ?
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I think you can and should do both if there’s something you’re trying to get done. You can do a ritual to get a job but God works through people, he send things to you through people, if you sit around in your apartment and do rituals to get a job but never send out resumes or go on interviews you will get nowhere.
I also think there’s a lot of truth to Peter Carroll’s idea who says that you have to believe in whatever paradigm it is that you’r working with or it won’t be effective.
Now i don’t know about Wicca or whatever but there are certian paradigms that make it easy to accept them on an experiential level. By this I mean that if you start checkin them out, the autonomous archetypal complexes (or the gods, if you want to just use the one syllable word) will get your attention and let you know that they are there.
I think Crowley was right when he said that they might be ideas or excretions of the collective unconscious or whatever, but if something sends you flying across a room then it becomes less of an abstraction.
For my money that is what makes ritual magic work, are the spirits themsleves, who have certain tastes - like people they want to be acknowledged, respected, etc, and they like somethings but not others and they don’t do anything for free. Just like the real world.
Other people have other paradigms based on faith etc. But mine is based on bartering. It works when I need it to so I see no reason to intellectualize it, I try to take it at face value.
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More importantly, it’s profoundly solipsistic to assume that your little magical powers can change the course of history and the world. It’s hubris. It’s not for us as individuals to decide.
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SAYS WHO it’s not for us individuals to decide. I’m sorry but this just sounds to me like a cop out a reason not to do anything.
If not me, then who? as the saying goes.
The only caveat I have is that the individuals are replaceable, its really the system taht has to change and that will take sustained effort by a LOT of people, not just one.
Get rid of the nude witch-on-witch action
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get rid of it?
what a buzzkill!
‘playing’ in this sense can be very dangerous- starting with screwing around with entities of unknown iontention all the way to experiencing ego-dissolution without guidance, which has landed a few folks in serious trouble-
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That’s true.
I don’t know thugh what is the distincton between high and low magic or ritual magic or whatever
seems to me that love, health, money, success etc are all perfectly legitimate things to work for
and ask for help with for example the way you would ask for help from a friend
or you could ask for a favor from someone and you tell them “hey if you deliver this package for me there willbe a nice meal for you when you come back”
quid pro quo
like like people doing favors for each other in the real world too
Oh, sure- I just wanted to clarify the terminology.
Good analogy.
Well, you know, I could spend ages trying to get the light on by simply thinking about it, but that would be nonsense, wouldn’t it? It’d be far simpler, and less time consuming, to just go over to the light switch and flick it on.
The former would be wanking, the latter would be pragmatic. Which is a distinction one has to make sometimes, as you can only spend so much time on “the astral” without “descending” to the “dross of matter”.
Oh, and besides:
What is that all about, eh? Sounding a bit judgmental there, aren’t we. “I don’t know what you do whatsoever, apart from the preconceptions in my mind, but anyway, here’s something you should do …”
“I’ve never been able to do the ritual thing. i have a hard time believing in it —
It’s actually inherently practical; you don’t have to “believe†in it. It becolmes self evident.”
my feelings exactly — i don’t for a second discount the validity of ritual magick, i just suspect that a lot of people who THINK they’re doing it are really tinkering with stuff they don’t understand. i tend to think that there are, however, people out there who are quite adept at it. what i’m skeptical of, for one reason or another, is my own ability (or even willingness?) to enter the space where i would start to “get results”. is this something that most people experience before they’ve delved in, or is there a tendency for people who are “good” at it to believe in it/feel confident about it from the outset? or maybe there isn’t a trend in either direction and it’s 100% an individual basis thing? i have other “gifts” as i see it, medical intuition for one and other energy/healing stuff. i generally experience this part of myself as very amorphous and intuitive — sort of the opposite of ritualistic. i move according to hunches. maybe this is an incorrect perception, the perception of the gap between the two modes.
…
i don’t have any sort of conclusion about this, i think it just opens up more questions, so i’m just gonna throw it out there as it is.
At times I think ritual magic is just the earliest version of NLP… it’s a way of tricking and short circuiting your active, rational, logical mind in order to accomplish something.
It’s a way of shutting down the active mind long enough to bypass it and enact your “true” will.
You can use ritual, linguistics, drugs, music, yoga, exercise or almost anything to do that…
Of course. I have no qualms about being judgemental. Nor do I have any about being wrong. I’m often both. Great insights from everybody. I ask questions cause I don’t understand…
hat i’m skeptical of, for one reason or another, is my own ability (or even willingness?) to enter the space where i would start to “get resultsâ€. is this something that most people experience before they’ve delved in, or is there a tendency for people who are “good†at it to believe in it/feel confident about it from the outset? or maybe there isn’t a trend in either direction and it’s 100% an individual basis thing? i have other “gifts†as i see it, medical intuition for one and other energy/healing stuff. i generally experience this part of myself as very amorphous and intuitive — sort of the opposite of ritualistic. i move according to hunches. maybe this is an incorrect perception, the perception of the gap between the two modes.
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When you first get into it you are very nervous about following the rules, because you are kind of flying blind and you aren’t sure you did it right
and you mess up a lot
then eventually when you do get the hang of it it starts to work in a very dramatic way
and intuition is a HUGE part of that, you learn to feel the countours and personalities of your “assistants” and who you are “negotiating” with
then they will themselves tell and teach you how to improve
sit at the foot of your bed and talk to you in the nighttime
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Well, you know, I could spend ages trying to get the light on by simply thinking about it, but that would be nonsense, wouldn’t it? It’d be far simpler, and less time consuming, to just go over to the light switch and flick it on.
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turning on a light takes five minutes why would you spend 45 minutes trying to grease the wheels so that somebody else wanders in the room and does it, or the electrical wiring does it by some fluke?
Do it yourself. Magic is not for tricks. Its for things that you need to survive all the ways up Maslow’s hierarchy
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a way of tricking and short circuiting your active, rational, logical mind in order to accomplish something.
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You can read about Huna magic that is very instructive
they talk about tree centers of will in your spirit
the mind sends instructions down to another center in your stomach
which is the engine with all the juice an dpower
but also stubborn and easily distracted like a little kid
but if you can lead it it can really work wonders to improve the lives of yourself and everyone around you
My 2 cents in the web machine here brings the following re: ritual magic{k} - I kind of regard most ritual as a computer program, ie it is designed to work in a fashion that ostensibly has worked for someone some where before. Belief not required. I am totally fucking agnostic insofar as this goes.
In this book on Evocation that I paid a shitload of money for (vol. II I might add), it is posited that only a ‘mature’ soul would be allowed to progress beyond this ’sphere’ or qliphot or whatever (read shell), and that I regard to be karmically aware, and already beyond “getting jane to perform sexual favors” or “going invisible” to rob a bank or something. And beyond, as much as possible, tanha, read: desire. It’s a Buddhist thing. Also, the GD and OTO/AA symbols, signs, and clothes/accoutrements are supposed to provide reassurance to higher “intelligences” that indeed the seeker is “well and truly qualified” to pass.
cya.
-tc
syseng@msn.com
“mother life, hold firmly onto me”
-yes
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