How true is it that reading fiction strengthens your magickal practice?

[jacobus]

I was reading Theodore Rose's "Lucifer and the Hidden Demons" the other day. He says that reading fiction is one of the greatest things you could do in your occult practice. How true have you found this to be?

 

[Adrian]

I will be speaking from my experience as someone who practices Greek goeteia. Most of my sources are works of fiction from that period as there are not a lot of occult/historical sources on things like ritual setup, choreography, etc. 'Write what you know' is as old as time and at least some of the ritual practices from fiction have to be accurate to some degree.

 

[Eliyel]

It probably depends on the fiction you're reading, but I've found it to be more of a setback than a help. As a long-time occult-horror nerd, getting into actual occult practices has been a tedious process of unlearning all kinds of tropes and misconceptions that get thrown into works that prioritize entertainment over accuracy. I also see a lot of people get so entrenched in their favorite fantasy worlds that they're unwilling to accept that reality might differ from their expectations, which ends with them getting stuck in a rut of mistaking their own daydreaming for spiritual encounters and never making any real progress.

If you enjoy fiction and find it more engaging than textbooks and theses, I'm sure it can be a useful tool to get a vague idea of the bare basics of some subjects. But the number of fictional occult films, books, and games I can now recognize as having done considerable legitimate research on the subject they covered is very, very low.

 

[Beyond Everything]

He says that reading fiction is one of the greatest things you could do in your occult practice.

lol would that it was so simple