Building blocks of a practitioner

[Vandheer]

We live in the golden age of information. In this forum alone there is more information and books that would shock the magicians of old times - truly a blessing.

With the abundance of information at hand, notice the tiny problem? Yeah, where are you supposed to start? We all asked that question, and this is just my thoughts on the matter.

The Way I See It

I see two ways in practice. The Way of Heart, and The Way of Mind. Unfortunately I don't have much experience in the former, but I will still recommend one source that is surely solid.

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I can hear some of you saying "Worship? Are you kidding me?". Well, don't knock it off until you try it. Perhaps it will give you a fresh perspective. You are all most welcome to suggest more choices to read upon here, I unfortunately lack at this one.

The Way of Mind

There is unfortunately no foolproof way of doing magick. If there were, everyone would be studying the same curriculum at the moment, but alas, it hasn't come so far. Even science isn't sure of itself anymore.

It would be basically a science if half of your attempts worked. So do not fear failure, and get to work, now. There is being confused forever and then there is being confused but trying.

There are two type of training that even the most hardcore non believer wouldn't deny and would benefit from. Them being Concentration and Energy work (you are alive after all).

Train on these two, and your chances of success get much higher. Best part, these will simply enhancr your mundane lives, so whats there to lose?

FOR CONCENTRATION

I believe these are good sources:

1 -

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2 -

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3 -

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4 -

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These are more than enough imo. Always, anyone is welcome to suggest more.

FOR ENERGY WORK

Aside from the obvious, such as working out, excersising, martial arts, a good diet, pilates, etc., I will only recommend one short book that is free of dogma and easily workable.

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Without overstaying my welcome here, I hope these will help. I do not see why they shouldn't. They are very safe to practice if you do them "by the book", you shouldn't encounter much problems. And they wouldn't prevent you from trying other stuff.

Hope that helped - Best of luck!!

 

[KjEno186]

This is excellent. The only thing I would add is that a beginner organize a daily practice that can be carried out without fail. All good habits require regularity such that they survive the inevitable loss of enthusiasm which occurs in a matter of weeks. From then on it becomes a test of will. Try not to take on too much practice work in the beginning. If you begin with half an hour a day, never let a day go by without using it for your practices. Starting out with an hour or more may lead to an early burn out.

 

[HoldAll]

Just uploaded the theurgy book because it was on my hard disk, haven't read it yet.

I think you're spot on concerning the Way of the Heart and the Way of the Mind. I'm having trouble with the former as well but also a nagging feeling that it may become important any time now and that I will soon get stuck if I ignore the Way of the Heart because I'm too cynical, bookish, whatever. It's like the question I once posted in the forum - "Just how did the old mages do it?", meaning without meditation, breathwork, visualization practice, energy work, etc. The answer is probably the Way of the Heart. The Abramelin ordeal, for example, is nothing but devotion, pure heartfelt emotion and "enflaming oneself with prayer".

Now and then I'd try and recite some incantations to Greek gods but the words just sound flat, embarrassing, lifeless. I have already seriously considered looking into acting and how to make my delivery more convincing. Without heart… the mind alone probably is not enough.

 

[Roma]

Without heart… the mind alone probably is not enough.

Quite so. And the heart almost always needs to be mastered before the higher will (atma). Just as well!

 

[DiLoco_DelEted]

I would add learn all basic Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram and Hexagrams as well.

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I would also add a MUST is to keep both a Dream and Ritual Diary.

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Inducing trance as well.

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A page showing the hexagram flow and the signs 9f the planets and zodiac to draw inside the center of the hexagram, and general ritual outline:

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[beardedeldridge]

I worked at developing the way of the mind but I still fall into the way of the heart very easily. I just allow myself to fall back into some of the most intense religious experiences from my youth. Works really well for me. It’s really quite amazing how those more intense formative experiences never fully leave us.

There’s a ton of beginner routine suggestions out there just pick one but no matter what you do learn to meditate and master that heart and that mind. It isn’t easy and it always seems like a work in progress but that effort will pay huge dividends in your efforts to walk a magickal/spiritual path.

-Eld

 

[pixel_fortune]

I read a short work called "How to develop a magical system" which I liked - it gave 4 Pillars

1. Meditation
2. Cleansing/banishing/purification
3. Devotional
4. Praxis (specific workings that are not part of a regular routine)

I would add energy work, making it part of either 1 or 2.

To make it more meaningful, you could align these to a symbol set that speaks to you. The four elements obviously, but they're already heavily laden. There's symbol sets everywhere though. Inanna's symbols are the star, the rose, the lion, and the dove. Head, heart, hands, hustle. Four rivers/creeks in your local area. Your four favourite grimoires. Dryads, naiads, nereiads and maenads.

"Devotional" covers a lot of ground - eg ancestor offerings, animism, not just trad prayer. I found offerings a useful way in because it's a physical practice. When you pray but don't feel anything, what else is there? You feel like you failed at the prayer.
But putting out offerings always feels like you've succeeded at the practice even if you don't feel anything, and that means you're not undermining yourself with doubts.

We are embodied creatures; physical actions often produce feelings rather than the other way around.

In Rediscover the Magick of the Gods and Goddesses: Revealing the
Mysteries of Theurgy , di Biasi says
"A part of us is divine, but [...] after centuries of brainwashing it might be difficult to believe in our own divinity and to understand what it is. For this reason, it is useful to be helped by an outer divinity, which has a close relationship with who you are."
He suggests choosing a deity that is like an idealised self, that feels very closely matched to you. (I've done the opposite, and chosen a deity with traits I admire but am deficient in)

I can imagine that this would help produce devotional feelings - because you can probably whip up some ardent longings to become [more courageous/ a better writer / whatever]

Frater Barrabbas in Mastering the Art of Ritual Magick talks about developing a "personal cult" (a one-person cult) which is a similar idea - you are devoted to the deity which is also your Higher Self which is also you and you long for them.

I think rather than starting with a deity and trying to feel devotion for them, it might make more sense to identify what you admire and feel in awe of (a city? Trees? An admirable character trait, like compassion or intelligence? An art or craft? How crazy outer space is? Music? Books?) and then see what spirit or deity overlaps with that and try and let your emotion for one spill over into the other (in the case of animism, the spirit is in the thing itself, no middleman needed)

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I was raised atheist/agnostic in a very secular country so I don't have any religious experiences or enculturation to fall back on - a lot of magicians* seem to need to process their relationship to christianity in some way, whether they end up pushing back against it, returning to it, or borrowing parts of it, but it's just sort of flat/nothing for me, except when the specific words happen to be beautiful

* Magicians I encounter on the internet, which means overwhelmingly but ofc not exclusively Americans

 

[DiLoco_DelEted]

I worked at developing the way of the mind but I still fall into the way of the heart very easily. I just allow myself to fall back into some of the most intense religious experiences from my youth. Works really well for me. It’s really quite amazing how those more intense formative experiences never fully leave us.

There’s a ton of beginner routine suggestions out there just pick one but no matter what you do learn to meditate and master that heart and that mind. It isn’t easy and it always seems like a work in progress but that effort will pay huge dividends in your efforts to walk a magickal/spiritual path.

-Eld

This is an excellent point. If you have ever been to a Catholic, Apostiolic or Pentecostal church, not saying it is not present in other churches or temples, but the mass, glossolalia occurrences, basking in the spirit, intense worship and prayer with incense scented altered states induces trance.
So much as recalling it vividly may induce trance.
If not, obtain a 54 beaded or 108 beaded preferably alternating black and white beads, chanting an easy to memorize and speak mantra or scripture quote, or even concentrating on an image and speaking the image, say "Spirit" for example, may also induce trance.

 

[Yazata]

Great post.

What I think one of the big problems with the amount of info available is, is that instead of going through a book over the period of a year, or getting the lesson from a course one month at a time, some will scroll through half a dozen books while eating their dinner and decide "okay, I've done all this in the past 15 minutes but nothing is working for me".

Doing something every day, no matter if you notice a benefit immediately is key. Sticking with something and building a foundation is literally how every sport, art or skill is taught and learned.

I like the description of the way of the heart and way of the mind. More than once I've been told that I need to think with my heart more. It's hard but I try.

 

[pixel_fortune]

What I think one of the big problems with the amount of info available is, is that instead of going through a book over the period of a year, or getting the lesson from a course one month at a time, some will scroll through half a dozen books while eating their dinner

Yes! Which WF doesn't help, tbh. It's very easy to see "oh a new book uploaded, I'll skim that right now"

I've been thinking of developing a little prayer/rite for beginning to read a book. Something along the lines of putting it on my altar, lighting a candle, thanking the author and any powers relevant to the content, asking that it sink into my brain and be put to good use (or an index card with the book's title written on it, for ebooks)

But the purpose would basically be like a puzzle-feeder for books - the thing that stops pets from wolfing down their food way too fast and immediately throwing up

 

[Roma]

some will scroll through half a dozen books while eating their dinner

As far as I can recall, once I had learned a basic meditation technique, all the intervention/action techniques appeared in my meditation.

 

[beardedeldridge]

I was raised atheist/agnostic in a very secular country so I don't have any religious experiences or enculturation to fall back on - a lot of magicians* seem to need to process their relationship to christianity in some way, whether they end up pushing back against it, returning to it, or borrowing parts of it, but it's just sort of flat/nothing for me, except when the specific words happen to be beautiful

* Magicians I encounter on the internet, which means overwhelmingly but ofc not exclusively Americans

Someone can always build that base but when it’s already been built…no need reinventing the wheel. But you’re right, especially for people picking another path, they do seem to “need” to process the new path or at least their understanding of it through the lense of the religion of the area they grew up in. Even if they themselves weren’t that religious.

-Eld

 

[pixel_fortune]

Well

Someone can always build that base but when it’s already been built…no need reinventing the wheel

Yes and no

I mean: there's no need to reinvent the wheel but there may be value in reinventing the wheel

Eg building something yourself, even if the result is not as good as what you could get off the shelf

Drawing out a sigil instead of printing it, crafting your own tools, writing your own prayers

(non-magically as well - people still bake their own bread even though it's typically quicker, cheaper and better from the store, location-depending)

Of course you have to pick and choose what you make yourself, what you have time for and what you actually like making yourself vs when your time could be better spent elsewhere

But I've enjoyed putting together my own cosmology etc, testing the boundaries of what there's strong evidence for, and what might be up for negotiation (I don't mean making up my own deities, but like "do I think deities are different entities, or are they facets of the one god?" and mapping the sephiroth to what we know about the big bang - stuff like that. I guess you could say I'm reinventing the wheel but I'm using pre-existing spokes I saw lying around)

The other positive is I can talk about stuff like that with any of my friends (who mostly have no interest in the occult) because everyone's interested in how the universe began and what its nature is

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(well, I can talk about any aspect of the occult with my friends, but it's usually in the "hobby no one else cares about" category - "I get to talk about the occult for 5 minutes and then you get to talk about tennis for 5 minutes")

 

[beardedeldridge]

Well

Yes and no

I mean: there's no need to reinvent the wheel but there may be value in reinventing the wheel

Eg building something yourself, even if the result is not as good as what you could get off the shelf

Drawing out a sigil instead of printing it, crafting your own tools, writing your own prayers

(non-magically as well - people still bake their own bread even though it's typically quicker, cheaper and better from the store, location-depending)

Of course you have to pick and choose what you make yourself, what you have time for and what you actually like making yourself vs when your time could be better spent elsewhere

But I've enjoyed putting together my own cosmology etc, testing the boundaries of what there's strong evidence for, and what might be up for negotiation (I don't mean making up my own deities, but like "do I think deities are different entities, or are they facets of the one god?" and mapping the sephiroth to what we know about the big bang - stuff like that. I guess you could say I'm reinventing the wheel but I'm using pre-existing spokes I saw lying around)

The other positive is I can talk about stuff like that with any of my friends (who mostly have no interest in the occult) because everyone's interested in how the universe began and what its nature is

Post automatically merged: Dec 7, 2023

(well, I can talk about any aspect of the occult with my friends, but it's usually in the "hobby no one else cares about" category - "I get to talk about the occult for 5 minutes and then you get to talk about tennis for 5 minutes")

No I understand (and we all end up reinventing the wheel if you progress down this path far enough - in the end this path ends up being very personal and spiritual) you can definitely start from scratch and invent/discover an entire practice without ever reading/using anything (harder to do in this day and age of mass information overload but that’s another conversation) but it definitely is the longer way around (and far beyond creating your tools/etc…which I’m a huge proponent of) to get started especially if your goal is results/needs based in the beginning. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it and if you stay with it you will have something that is almost entirely your own.

But if you want to build a skyscraper to the heavens it’s probably easier to start with an engineering degree.*

*My attempt at humor before my first cup of coffee has kicked in.

-Eld

 

[KjEno186]

I've been reading the book Rolling Thunder by Doug Boyd, who wrote about the events he experienced with a Native American medicine man in the early 1970s. I came across a paragraph that seems to fit here:

At Council Grove, Rolling Thunder had said: "I want to warn you not to copy me, but work out your own method. Our people tell us to be original. If you can watch the method, though, and the way I go about it, maybe that would give you some thoughts about what to follow, what it's all about. Then you work out your own substance, your own songs, your own prayers and things to go with it. It's not good to copy."​

​

Books like this describe to me the "way of the heart" that has been talked about in this thread.

 

[TheMouse]

So do not fear failure, and get to work, now. There is being confused forever and then there is being confused but trying.

. . . i needed to hear this today . . . thank you . . . . .

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. . . everyone in this culture, men especially, get their hearts shut down so early in the social conditioning process . . . . so how to open to that Heart Wisdom? . . . . for me it all starts with Empathy . . . . opening up to becoming an Empathic ShapeShifter . . . . . just allowing and leaning into empathic connections with anything . . . . like a tiny house spider . . . watching as she works . . . imagining myself in her place . . . how might i go about building my web . catching my flies . . how can i weave that feeling, that connection into my Mind Work? . . . . even the simplest empathic connections lead to more diverse and useful perspectives and conversations . . . . . from spiders to birds to cats to trees to people . . . . . . that’s where i see the real magickal power of Heart . . . Empathic ShapeShifting . . . . . . . . .

 

[Konsciencia]

That suits me, I am such a pure hearted person. However, I don't let anyone take advantage of my Heart.

 

[DiLoco_DelEted]

I think too that regular consistency and dedication and devotion are key, but if "Adept" activities can be integrated into a noobs routine, then so be it.

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One more thing .. this (sane) brain is the only one we have for life. Dont follow blindly into deep dark corners like I have if you are a seeker of the light:
Books to read: "The Tree of Life" (Regardie), "The Mystical Qabalah" (Fortune, Sane Occultism (Fortune)
Groups that dont lead you astray, lighter groups if you will: Quareia (

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), Fraternity of the Hidden Light ( lvx.org ), Builders of the Adytum ( bota.org )