I have several Occult friends that I can speak pretty frankly with about a lot of things. I’ve been speaking with some of them lately after there was (another) series of “betrayals” and “backstabbing” that caused rifts (not mine). Some may be permanent. Some may not. Not for me to say or speculate.
It has led to conversations, not just recently, about the Occult community as a whole and why this may be. Normally, this is lifted up as a dark example of what the Left Hand Path does to people, but it was just as vicious and no different with any church or religious branch I’ve witnessed either. The Right Hand Path is just as broken. Well, maybe I should say the organizations in the RHP are just as broken. We really aren’t talking about paths here, but people, typically groups of them. We instinctively know this with the LHP. Online or physical. I can post stuff in demonolatry sub and people get pissy – which is amusing. Sorry, but if Leviathan or Belial wants to get shitty with me and I choose to stand up to it, it doesn’t mean it’s my fault. Hypothetical, but has happened with other entities.
If Mormonism could’ve given me the spiritual path I personally needed, I would still be there. I would’ve had no reason to question. I already have a bit of a service-based path until I exceed that service or it’s clear that it isn’t serving the agreement. While you’d think this would be a lifetime thing, I was released from service from an entity I deeply care for and greatly respect the other night. The bond is still there, but I have been moved on to continue my journey of progression. There IS a sense of loss.
But, as my relationships aren’t about worship and about growth and helping those that help me grow (a Goetic in this case), this shouldn’t come as a surprise. I am not food. And I am pleased to see that those I help or serve know this and honor it.
What does this have to do with the topic at hand? A lot. In the end.
Most people don’t come to Magic, the Occult, or Religion because things are great or “good enough”. There are those people and I’ve met some, but there was usually something broken in the past that led them to want the structure, the community, the framework to work within. Wanting a framework was partly why I joined the military way back then. It’s a powerful thing and can provide a lot of benefits. It did for me and I knew I should leave it when it was time. I still haven’t left the Occult, but I was more of a “spiritual, but not religious” sort.
With stability can come…harder work, just when one things it’s about to get easier. This is usually the place people are in when I find them, to one degree or another, and it can rightly be asked (rhetorically) if this ever stops. Normally, we engage with others on or from similar paths, with similar broken bits from the past. This is a form of support and can lead to really meaningful relationships as we help each other grow, support each other. This is a bit of a vulnerable time, in the beginning, when our feet aren’t underneath us AND we’re trying to navigate and learn another craft to help deal with all of it, past, present, and future – via Magic.
It’s also easy to hold on too tightly to things that have provided stability or to stop investigating whether those things are still applicable to where that person is NOW. It should ALWAYS be changing when growth is happening. That doesn’t mean that it is reevaluated constantly, but maybe should be every year or whenever your guiding spirit says it’s time. Some still latch onto the paths from the past until it becomes a religion of sorts.
While I am pursuing the Maoshan path in a way as similar as possible to that when it was formed MUCH longer ago that the ceremonial paths in Europe, I’m doing this because I want to understand that path – having already achieved competency in similar areas. It’s not sacrosanct to me. I already know there are other ways to do similar things. Why bring it up? Because if Magic was the sole premise of Age as Authority then most Solomonic Magic can shit itself in favor demonstrably older forms that are more primitive, but cover most of the same crap regular people care about – relationships, wealth, fortune, weather, ….
The Lesser Key solidified things FOR CEREMONIAL MAGIC. It isn’t present in the same way for Indian and Asian cultures. Any idiot can make correlations and the desperate will, because to do anything else requires work in different ways and people don’t want to be beginners again – like I am with the Maoshan stuff. This means one will see a hardening and great resistance when this is brought up or ignorant indifference because the skills (for or against) aren’t there. JUST like the RHP people that have devoted themselves to single book or a few book currents and reject anything else when they clearly don’t feel like their spirituality is anything approaching “full” from a cultivation standpoint.
It’s actually kinda sad. I’ve seen great, talented magicians/occultists/spiritualists not be able to leave these things. People that I believe, some of them, I genuinely believe could advance those currents with less rigidity and a greater understanding of other ways magic also manifests. Or could advance the rest of us with the expansion of their insight outside of those current and they will not. Of course, this is to be respected, but that doesn’t make it less of a loss to those that recognize the potential, if realized. There IS the argument that “Magic” isn’t the right word, once one has progressed and it becomes a merger, but that’s a different thing that is way beyond this.
Most of the disagreements I typically see involve either a discord in personal beliefs, personal practices, and straight up jackassery. Not much we can do about jackassery, clearly present on both “hands” of the path (and the middle), however well disguised. (I had to add ‘jackassery’ to the dictionary. Why? It’s everywhere…)
There are people that use techniques and methods I don’t agree with. I can give the middle finger to most things considered important in other paths that don’t involve the direct involvement of an entity. Yes, some of this is a matter of taking from that “source” in a manner beneficial to the working. I would humor some of them by saying I had to take it from Degree X and aspect Y when celestial object Z was… But it’s really more simple than that when you have a WORKING dialogue with your Self and most of it doesn’t matter with the appropriate application of energy to the working. In short, access the right type of energy and it will work. If you want to wait for Mars to Full Moon Uranus, that’s on you (been waiting to say that – NOT legit).
All of our magic still works. It would be pretty ridiculous for someone that knows and has seen how my stuff works to suggest I HAVE to do it their way. Similarly, when I ask for help or help a group for others, I don’t insist things be done in my style. That would be inefficient and I want them at their appropriate time just as the want me in mine – and sometimes I wait. Mostly don’t need to, but still – a day or until my schedule can fit it in. I can do things in more rigid styles and have, for prolonged periods (about a year, daily, with methods I didn’t like or agree with), but only when the path I was following required it (and will with the Maoshan).
This leaves us with personal conflicts. One thing I’ve found is that there is a relationship to “power”, perceived or real, and this plays a role. Makes sense, since we’re really still animals, just a bit more complex. Most of us have had issues with this in our own lineage and/or other ways of defining “family”. And it is complex, just as complex as we, as humans are. And similar things can be seen in our closest genetic relatives – apes.
We normally “choose” our Occult family. Well, regardless of path, this is still just as complex as we are. This and the changing of the practitioner over time is really the crux of this post, isn’t it? But it also imposes the other glaring issue – the word “family”.
You will be VERY hard-pressed to find a legitimate post of mine saying “brother” or “sister”. I don’t use it. That is an unfortunate holdover from Mormonism where everyone is a “brother” and “sister” and they pass judgements like they were anything more than a sack of meat parroting what they’re supposed to. I know it’s popular in many circles and I don’t use it non-literally. I assume we are until shown otherwise.
One could say it’s a brotherhood or sisterhood, and that’s fine for those that need a community feel. I think this illustrates that I, just like most I know, am or have been “broken” at some point. Or I’d be a Priest somewhere else, right? The Ceremonials and Larpers would reign supreme (sometimes the same, but identifiable).
I guess my point is that all of us have edges that are sharp. We have mannerisms that can be brusque. We have parts of ourselves to protect. And we’ve been shown that this needs to happen, sometimes numerous times. Is that the same as jackassery? No. Not for me. It’s a protection mechanism. Sometimes this helps us, sometimes it’s doesn’t. But it HAS helped us in the past and this is what makes it so hard to question and test. Who wants to be hurt…again…? If we are to be leaders or models for others to strive to be in our useful ways to them, however long or short, then we should also be prepared to self-reflect and “try” to determine when, maybe how much, to shift things to continue our progression – magical or personality wise.
Speaking of jackassery…
I typically draw the line at noticing someone has been casting against MINE. No, there’s no free ride for casting against me or “fucking” me over deliberately. I’m no saint. Can’t say I know any living ones and that’s fine with me. Wouldn’t trust their world experience if I did, heh heh.
Oppose what I say/do/act on? Fine. Your right, as it is mine. Who am I to say you can’t oppose what I do/say/etc.
Target MINE and it gets through – you’ll see how long my memory is. Which is beneficial when I don’t need strong emotion. And since I’ve already put a post out about not needing it, I would consider that position. Magic, without cultivation, is not going to get anyone as far as they think once the “basics” are settled. Keep that in mind and find your method when your basics are and you’re stable enough to do so. Consult your guides at this point. My stuff isn’t ready yet and ALL of it requires a really long time.
I guess the point is that we don’t come to this path without bumps, bruises, warts, and razor sharp edges. Doesn’t mean we should still have them, with appropriate self-work, the schedule of which is on others. I would just caution against “rage quitting” because someone disagrees with us on several issues. That’s pretty petty and we should use our newfound magical skills and those spirits we’ve met urging us to do better (if they aren’t, fuck em’) to maybe be more tolerant than the rest of the world.
Which seems really fucking easy to do lately.
Like it or not, any one of us can pick up a wand and cast, make a petition, or whatever, to change the parts of the world, largely OUR world, as we see fit. I don’t have to agree with you to help with that. Kindly consider the same.
There are probably more atheists than competent magicians. They can’t change much of anything outside of Youtube or social media. But us few, banding together for causes and/or friendship?
I’ll cast for that.
