personal

09
Mar
2015

Round Pegs and Round Holes


Or Shut Up and Stick It In
square_peg_round_hole[1]Sometimes magickians go out of their way to make things more complicated than they need to be. That in and of itself could be a series of rants, but instead I want to focus on something that happened to me recently. I performed a mo dice reading from a friend, and got Ra-Na, The Dried Up Tree, it’s not a good answer, but the piece of advice was to perform rituals of offering for deceased family and ancestors.
So I explained that things didn’t look good, but he should give offerings to his dead family and ancestors, not to get them to fix it, but to make sure they’re maintained. Hungry ghosts are disruptive ghosts. So we talked a bit and he said something that gave me pause, so I asked and found out he thought I meant family/ancestors as in his past lives. Admittedly sometimes the tradition we work with uses that language-coding, but I had to clarify this time I meant blood family, and actual ancestors, not ancestors as code for past-lives.
“I don’t have any dead family, none of them stuck around.” So I explained one of the models of the soul in several parts which says that the “soul proper” reincarnates, but leaves a shade or remnant behind, an echo that can be animated. My Grandmother died seven years ago, and her soul has moved on, but she still visits me, and I have good conversations at her grave. “I don’t have any connection to my family that is dead.” I explained that it’s not about a connection like that, that’s why some systems of ancestor work uses people who died long before you were born or even parents or grandparents were born, it’s not about a standard idea of familial love, but this idea of supporting your legacy. So even if you didn’t connect in life, or weren’t alive at the same time doesn’t mean you can’t give them offerings, and that they won’t help out. I also explained that offerings to dead family can be made to their current lives, whoever/wherever Grandma is, I can offer her my merit to help out, in the belief that it will benefit her current life.
After a while he responded “So I guess I’m screwed and there is nothing I can do.”
This baffled me. He spent a large portion of our conversation transforming the round peg I offered him into a square peg that no longer fit. I wasn’t asking for a huge change in beliefs, I wasn’t railing against his ideas, I didn’t suggest anything drastic. All I said was to perform an offering to dead family and ancestors, tea and bread by the pictures I know he has up of them. Instead he complicated the issue by trying to force it to match his beliefs “So by family you mean past lives?” “I don’t have any dead family.” “I don’t have any connection to my family that is dead.” “There is nothing I can do.”
Now granted, I hate people who pull, twist, and mixmatch traditions improperly, and appreciate synthesizing beliefs intelligently. On the other hand when you ask for advice, and get clear advice (mo is straightforward there, which is part of why I love it), and you’d rather mangle the advice until it can’t fit or work in your world, then you’re doing something wrong.
Yes I’m picking on a friend a bit here, but I see this a lot. Sometimes life gives you a round peg and a round hole, so shut up and stick it in. Occultists seem to like complicating matters, yes, synthesis is brilliant, but sometimes your attempt at synthesis is more akin to blindfolded jigsaw puzzles.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
01
Mar
2015

Languages and Magick: Cultural Artefacts and Split Personalities


(The bulk of this post was written three years ago, but got lost in the shuffle. To refamiliarize yourself with my ramblings you can find Part One here and find Part Two here.)
I’ve touched a bit upon languages, alphabets and names in the past, but there is another aspect of language and magick that interests me. It’s less convoluted and more just varying opinions. What power does language have (as in a specific tongue), when, and why?
Religions and magickal traditions have all sorts of different opinions. I have Muslim friends who know no Arabic, except what it required to read and recite the Qur’an, and say their prayers. Not to mention Jewish friends that know only enough Hebrew to say the first part of many prayers “Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu *mumblemumblemumble*” The why and the how differs. Not surprisingly though very few Christians learn any Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic for their religion –and if you want to win arguments with them, learn these languages.
So why does language (not) matter in magick? I’m talking including religions here, because yes there is a big crossover with magick. There are all sorts of different opinions on why you should or shouldn’t use some language. My friends have explained that the words of Mohammad (P) are sacred, so when reciting the Qur’an or the prayers, they should say it as he said it, that the literal words are sacred. A Lukumi friend of mine has learnt Spanish, Yoruba, and some pidgin language of which the name escapes me for her prayers, for what seems to be a cultural respect. On the other side of things is good old Abraham von Worms who said essentially don’t pray in any language other than your mother tongue as you’ll never be as sure what you’re saying, and you could say or imply the wrong things. Even if you learn the language, there can be dozens of subtle nuances you won’t know if it isn’t your mother tongue, or you’ve spoken it regularly for less than a few decades.
Enochian magick pretty much is always initiated in Enochian. When studying with one lama I was told that my sadhanas (rituals) should be performed in Tibetan, but if I can’t manage that then English would work. He never really explained why and it later confused me when I was taught to do the same sadhana without speaking at all; should I be thinking in Tibetan or English? Yet at the same time many Tibetans do rituals in their Sanskrit forms (in fact my lama translates them into or back into Sanskrit sometimes), yet Mongolians often practice these same rituals in Tibetan. There is this clear idea that language matters, but it’s often the language of the other. So Western and Mongolian Buddhists might use Tibetan, but many Tibetans are using Sanskrit.
What does it matter? I think Lon Milo Duquette said it best, it was on a podcast, but I can’t remember which, possibly Thelema Coast to Coast, but when referring to the Enochian Entities he said something to the effect of “They’re like Frenchmen, they want you to take the effort to speak their language, even if you’ll fail horribly, and then they’ll talk to you in English.” In an earlier post Ars Mysteriorum said that higher beings can understand any language, but it is more polite to speak with them in the language they’re most familiar with. We agree it was a simplified analogy but the rough idea seems appropriate.
Many entities are culturally specific, and have been approached in the same language for hundreds or thousands of years, and while they may understand other languages, these are the languages of their history. One lama stresses performing the sadhanas traditionally, not because they are written in stone, don’t work in English, or anything, but out of respect for the tradition they come from, as well as believing there is a greater sympathy by performing the ritual in the same way and same language as many great saints, holy people, and magickians have for hundreds of years, while my other lama translates them into the older tongue of Buddhism, Sanskrit (but does not translate them into Pali, which is an even older tongue for Buddhism).
Is language in magick just an artefact? Is it an issue of respect? Is there magickal power to it? Another take is magickal languages (well languages in general, but this is Blue Flame Magick, not Blue Flame In General) cause split personalities. Aside from being confused by the language, or worried I’ll get something wrong, when I’m speaking in Enochian I /feel/ magickal. When not cringing at mispronunciations I can’t seem to correct just chanting in Tibetan makes me /feel/ more engaged. This is more than just my simple feelings about the matter though.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin (You’ll need an access code like a University library to get this I assume) in their November 2010 had a relevant article “Two Languages, Two Personalities? Examining Language Effects on the Expression of Personality in a Bilingual Context.”
It says “Self-reports and behavioral observations confirmed the effects of perceived cultural norms, language priming, and interlocutor ethnicity on various personality dimensions.” People, both notice about themselves and in others, that their personality shifts along “perceived cultural norms” when speaking in another language. People act, in a subtle stereotypical way, similar to the cultural/people that uses that language. In the tests English/French speakers tended to be more verbally aggressive, independent, and withdrawn when speaking in French, common stereotypical traits. Whereas native Chinese, Korean, and Spanish speakers who learnt English tended to be more extroverted, more assertive, and more open to new experiences when talking in English. Traits they associate with the North American English speaker.
Tibetan is the language of the day to day life of the Tibetan people, but Sanskrit and Pali were the languages that the early siddhis and yogis spoke, and by using it they are closer to them…if only in a stereotypical association of the other. English is day to day, but Enochian is supposed the language of the Angels, of course speaking Enochian seems magickal…if only for that reason.
The language rabbit hole goes deeper, because despite whatever objective power might be there, the subjective association of the magickal other adds something to languages in other language, and perhaps that little bit extra is worth pursuing.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
05
Jan
2015

Retreats, Rants, and Priorities


When last we left our hero Kalagni was proving eir inability to make reasonable decisions and had entered into a tantric retreat while working.
Anyways, I survived. The retreat was, not surprisingly, rough and tough and emotional. To make matters worse near the end I was told to complete the retreat a week early, meaning adding in about a thousand extra mantras per day.
It was definitely intense, and I can’t wait to do the next one.
Even though I finished a week ahead of schedule (a week before solstice) I’ve been decompressing and processing the experience since then. The retreat itself was a big event, but it’s finished with a fire puja, which is a long elaborate ritual of burning offerings. I spent two hours in the snow and slight drizzle invoking gods into a fire pit, and throwing food, alcohol, flowers, a hell of a lot of melted butter, and more into a fire. It was awesome, I cried…not cause of the ritual, because I had thick viscous black smoke in my eyes for a lot of the ritual.
One thing that came up with people before, during, and after was the fact that people often say to me things like “How do you manage to make time for all these things?” or “I wish I had the extra time to spend on my practice.” Here is the thing that bothers me, so here beginneth the rant, it is very unlikely that you don’t have the time, the thing is you’re not making it a priority. Don’t blame your life, you’re choosing not to do these things in most cases. I didn’t have a casual extra three hours a day to spend in my basement calling up gods and saying mantras, and there are things that would have been more fun, and more practically productive, at least short term, that I could have been doing. The thing is I make my magickal practice a priority.
When I did the Abramelin I had a fulltime working commitment, but still managed to dedicate nearly five hours a day to the ritual. Currently I work, volunteer, and go to temple three times a week (doing stuff unrelated to the retreat, and each temple session is a three hour minimum commitment), and I still managed to set aside two to three hours a day for the retreat. I even went out of country for a few days to spend some important time with friends, and still had time to follow through with my commitments.
How? It’s nothing special, I’m not saying it as a point of pride, it’s simply a matter of priority. Cut down the time you spend on email/twitter/facebook/youtube. Don’t watch tv, drop your hobbies, stop playing games, whatever. You probably work 8-10 hours a day including travel time, sleep another 8, you spend maybe two hours a day between preparing and eating food, one hour doing chores, that’s still 3-5 hours free. And to be honest most people spend less time preparing and eating and doing chores, and most people don’t sleep as much as they should. Your day is filled with all this time, it’s just a matter of prioritizing it. Even when I was at my friend’s place I made the retreat a priority, and as much as I loved spending time with everyone there, I still would excuse myself for a few hours a day and hide in a secluded area to do the ritual.
We’ve become a culture that often treats our entertainment as a right and necessity, and our commitments as choice. It should generally be reversed. Remember when you were a kid and your parents said you could go outside and play, or watch tv, but only after your homework and chores were done? That’s how we should treat our spirituality, especially if we’re trying to do something intense, or make time for a retreat. When you come home from work, don’t hope onto the computer or watch tv, go to your altar and do your prayers and mantras for the day. Don’t settle down to knit or play video games until your commitments are done.
It’s tough, you’ll miss your hobbies (but probably not as much as you think), you’ll have to really ration your social time with friends/family, and you might have to let things slip a bit. (Apologies to my neighbours about the state of my backyard during the retreat) But if you want to take your practice seriously, you have to treat it as seriously as anything else, if not more so. It shouldn’t be this boredom activity of “oh, I have an extra twenty minutes before bed, maybe I’ll meditate and talk to my Patron,” it should be something that you’ve made time for, that’s scheduled into your life, and everything not a necessity comes after.
If you don’t make the time for your gods, why should they make the time for you?

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
18
Nov
2014

Staycation…Kinda…


I did really well at posting on this blog regularly for a few months, but then, as always life interfered. In fact the only reason I have time to write this post is because life is interfering with life and I’m currently on the last leg of a long bus ride –edited and two days later I arrived at temple twenty minutes early so I could hurriedly upload this via the wifi of the coffee shop a few doors down.
For those wondering about my absence (I prefer to assume people wonder, rather than forget my existence) my life is busy busy again because I got a new job, I started volunteer tutoring (the same week I started working), my temple commitments have gone up to three times a week, and I’m also currently doing a lerung “working retreat.” A working retreat, as a friend of my put it, is a Buddhist staycation.
I guess for comparison you could see it as similar to the Abramelin in its structure. It’s a retreat where I live at home, though have a room set aside for this (reusing my Abramelin prayer room), and I’m allowed to work, and to an extent I’m allowed to be social, but several hours a day are involved in tantric rituals. So excluding this weekend my schedule has been wake up, ritual, work, ritual, sleep, wake up, ritual, work, ritual, sleep. I wish I was exaggerating that, but I seriously haven’t had time to go grocery shopping, or clean, or things like that (you know, I could have bought food rather than upload this…hindsight…). But the retreat is settling down into a rhythm so hopefully that will be less of an issue in the near future.
This means though that I don’t have time to really post until the retreat is over on the Winter Solstice (it’s short but intense and densely packed), so hopefully I should start getting some posts out around the new year.
Until then, go the way of your wishes.

Posted by kalagni
20
Oct
2014

Gate Crasher At The Ancestor Altar


Like most obsessed sorcerers I have several altars around my house. Sorry, according to Rinpoche I’m not obsessed, I’m “dedicated,” that sounds nicer. I’ve downsized recently, but I have my general and planetary altar, my chöd altar, my wealth altar, my Buddhist altar (okay a few of those), and my ancestor altar (recently just added a second one of those to discuss later).
Of all my altars my general/planetary and my chöd altar are my most “open” altars. When I do my morning prayers to the planetary angel while the offering is for them, it’s understood that what they don’t take/want can be taken by any spirit in the area. In chöd you go out of your way to call everyone you can to take the offerings. These altars are right on top of each other, so it tends to be, not surprisingly, where a lot of my random spirit activity occurs. My wealth and Buddhist altar(s) are semi-open, they’re dedicated to specific figures, but aren’t exclusive. I have trouble picturing a Bodhisattva getting annoyed that a random spirit is coming to take their offering. For the most part though since the work is directed to these figures no one else shows up.
Lastly there is my ancestor altar, which is closed in two ways. First it’s dedicated to my ancestors (imagine that) and anchored to them via photos, teacups, and art. Secondly it’s somewhat shielded. I wouldn’t say shielded or warded in the traditional sense, but it’s in my living room and I have it isolated from that space. While it is physically located in the living room, it’s energetically elsewhere behind a veil/shield, not for any super mystical reason, but as a genderqueer pansexual polyamorous sex-positive sorcerer my living room is often the scene of many things my very Christian ancestors might not approve of. (I may or may not be naked typing this within arm’s reach of the altar) So whenever I work with that altar, there is a stone I have to touch and “pull” the altar through that visual/sensory boundary.
One day, several weeks, back I opened the space, felt something off and thought nothing of it, and went about my weekly offerings. I lit the candles and incense as I chatted with my family about what had happened in the last week with the family and myself, I refilled their tea cups and noticed there was someone new in the space. Now every once and a while a new ancestor appears, it’s as if they talk from time to time, and someone says “Hey, your great-great-great grandkid is leaving us food and drink, come visit.” It’s weird, cause I don’t know these ancestors, my altar is for those I knew in life, but I’m not going to turn away someone just because they died before I was born. Anyways this new person didn’t feel right. There is a feel to ancestors, when the new people showed up I could feel the connection, I know they were family, and could even intuit roughly who they were (maternal/paternal and how far back). This new person didn’t feel like them in any way, he felt disconnected. It’s like when you’re in high school, there are 500+ students in your school, but you can immediately spot the transfer student in the crowd and tell they don’t fit in.
Before I could even address him, he asked for buttered tea. I asked who he was, and got no response, my awareness of him faded, so I left it. The next week he was there again, a bit stronger, I got a visual sense of him, he was an older white man, thick square glasses, and in a rocking chair, quite at home. Again he just suggested (cause asked implies too much communication) that he would like some buttered tea. This is odd, because buttered tea is a Tibetan drink, and that man is not Tibetan, and he didn’t strike me as someone who lived in Tibet or with the exile, he didn’t feel tied to Tibet/Tibetan Buddhism, he was just a strange old man asking for buttered tea. Again I asked who he was, and he faded out.
It sounds odd (because the rest of this story is so run-of-the-mill down to earth…) but I felt almost insulted by his presence. He wasn’t family, he wasn’t an ancestor, why is he inside my ancestor altar? I have two free-for-all offering buffet altars downstairs, why is he hanging around with my grandparents? As I’m overly polite with spirits (moreso than people most of the time) I decided to leave him be, I wasn’t going to cast him out, but I wasn’t going to indulge him without knowing who he is, or why he was there.
After several weeks of him occasionally showing up I got out a neutral coffee cup and made him buttered tea, which I served along with the drinks for my ancestors. The impression I got when I put down the tea for him? “Some apple crumble would be nice too.” It is amazing how someone seems unwilling to communicate, but still suggest/request to be fed in this manner. He got his tea, and no more.
It didn’t get rid of him, it wasn’t as if he wanted one last cup of tea before moving on, or anything like that. He’s a pretty “grounded” spirit, as solid as a stout ghost or ancestor that’s been worked with, he has presence and personality and awareness, which are really not common traits for wandering human spirits. Usually they’re weak, echoes, mentally dull, but not him. He still shows up, sometimes he’s an older man, sometimes he’s in his 40s-ish. He has the most unusual penetrating glance when his face prominently appears, as if his thick glasses are magnifying his sight, not just fixing it. I asked him to make use of the other altars for offerings, but he never showed up there.
I really have no idea who he is, or why he showed up, how he got into my ancestor altar and why he doesn’t go to any of the other ones.
This really is just to share some of what my magickal life is like, folks read my theorizing and my rants, but I thought I should also share some of what happens in my life. Also if you’ve had anything similar, or any ideas, I’m still trying to sort him out, so commentary is welcome.
He did lead me to creating two more categories of the dead beyond what my tradition held, but that will be discussed another time.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
26
Sep
2014

Goal Dirt: Grounding Your Magick


Since my last post on dirt ran long I decided to split it into two sections. Previously I talked about grave dirt, this time I’ll talk about goal dirt. I wish it had a better name, but it’s simple and gets the point across.
Goal dirt is dirt from a place related to a specific goal. Need a loan, or money? Get dirt from places like your bank, or your city’s financial district. Healing? Dirt from hospitals and temples. Hexing someone? Get dirt from their property (can also be mixed with dirt from places like dumps, prisons, cemeteries, major highways, and unfortunate places). Want a job, dirt from the building. Your imagination is the limit, as is how you use the dirt when you have it.
Goal dirt is a great way to add a physical anchor to your working, how to link it into a place and concept, to target your working and connect with it. Don’t underestimate the usefulness of linking a spell that is tied to a place into that place through the physical foundation, the earth it rests on.
To collect the dirt you need the same three things mentioned for collect grave dirt: offerings, spoon, and container.
Now offerings can be a bit tricky depending on where you are getting dirt from. While it might be a touch uncommon for someone to light incense or a candle at a grave, or even bring food, no one is going to question it. If I sat down in front of my bank though and lit a cone of incense, I’d get weird looks. On one hand as sorcerous people we should be fine with being weird; on the other hand, we don’t want attention sometimes. In this case things we can make use of smaller food offerings, or water which can be poured out of a bottle, or my favourite stealth offering, cigarettes.

My Jovian offering case.

My Jovian offering case.

Now I don’t smoke (though most of the dead people on my altar of the Beloved Dead do), but a cigarette is a great burnt offering. No one pays attention to someone standing by a building with a lit cigarette (you can mime smoking it if you want to look more normal and just blow out instead of inhaling, because the cigarette isn’t for you). Depending on what it is for I might use regular cigarettes, or I might use clove cigarettes (which I understand aren’t really available in Yankeeland) because cloves are a great offering to Jupiter. Also I’ve lit a cone of incense, and sat down beside it holding an unlit cigarette near it, so it looked like the smoke was from my cigarette while I went through my communication with the spirit of the place.
You do pretty much the same thing as you would at a grave. You have the option of either trying to see if there is a spirit of the place you can talk to, as you did with the grave owner, or just work with the energy of the place. I prefer to find a spirit if I can, if not I just work with the flows of energy. Try to find a place, if possible, that is both out of the way, but also connected to the place. So maybe a side path to the building, or out by the sign rather than the door, but still where there is some dirt. Reach out to the spirit, or just gather in the energy. This works well while fake smoking if you take that route.
Again tell the spirit why you want the dirt, what it is for, even if it’s just the energy I find it helpful to clarify the intent out loud. Continuing the stealth sorcery here is where a cellphone comes in handy, cigarette or bottle of water in one hand, cell against your ear, you look completely normal, meanwhile you’re chatting up the spirit/energy of the place. Getting the dirt is a bit trickier. I’m sure you can figure out a way if people are around. One time after tying my shoe I “weeded” a dandelion near my foot growing out of the crack in the sidewalk, looked normal, tossed it in my pocket as I turned around, and then later just took the dirt from the roots. Other times if I just don’t care I reach down with my spoon, just take a scoop and walk off. It all depends on where you’re taking it, your comfort level, and things like that.
If you’re collecting dirt from someone’s place to use against them you might have to collect it quickly, and without asking the spirit of the place. It’s not as powerful, but you do what you can, and a spirit of place might feel protective of the person that lives there. (Usually the energy won’t have the same qualm, which is why meta-modeling is a good thing.)
Use the dirt however you want, mixed with other components, stuffed into poppets and boxes, combined with ink and paint for sigils, whatever.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
08
Sep
2014

Better Choices, Highest Good, and Passing the Buck


“Do I take the new job, or stay where I am? What is the best option?”
Questions like this are really common, specifically the variation of that last point: What is best/better? Hell, I often think like that to myself, but frankly it’s a horribly ambiguous way to think, it’s also one that lacks power and responsibility.
It’s not something just from divination though, people use similar terms regarding the gods/guides. “Please put me on the better path” or “They know what is best.”
Maybe I’m in a nitpicky mood, but this always bothers me. These all presuppose that there is some singular ultimate universal best, and it’s just a matter of you getting there, and I don’t know if I believe that there is.
Take the job question above. “What is the best option [between these jobs]?” Well that could depend on what you mean. Job A might make you more money, but lead to a career so stressful it cuts ten years off your life. So what is better? A stressful shorter life with more money? Job B might make less but it could have better health and vacation benefits. So what is a better? More money, or having more freedom and time off? Maybe Job A is really emotionally fulfilling and Job B is brain numbing to you. Maybe Job B will suck for the next 5 years, but then you’ll get an awesome promotion. Maybe Job A is horrible, but you’ll meet the love of your life at it.
And so on and so on and so on. So when people ask me about the better options I do two things: I make them narrow it down (Do you mean financially, emotionally, physically, and what time frame? Etc.) and also look in terms of general knowledge. So rather than “what is better” my questions are “What does So-and-so need to know about A? B?” Often these answers are more revealing about their values, one way or another.
The reason I’m stressing this though, is so often when this comes up, the person doesn’t know what would make one job better, they haven’t figured out their values. They want the cards to make all the choices for them, even their value judgments. So if you ask about better options, make sure you can say what better would consist of.
Now even if there is some ultimate universal best for these people there are issues with that. They might not be ready for that best right now. As a matter of fact I would say if there is this ultimate universal best for all of us, that easily 95% of the world wouldn’t be happy with what it entails from their current position. Sure, maybe years down the line after they realized all the things that didn’t make them happy (but did briefly), and they’ve undone conditioning, or are over emotional attachments to “toxic” people, scenarios, whatever. So maybe according to the Cosmos Option A is best for them, but the person takes it, and quickly realizes they hate it and abandon it. How helpful was the reading then? They might not believe you, reject and deny you (as we often do with good advice).
The same and moreso for people who frame it in terms of their gods and whatnot. “To my highest good” has that problem, cause you might not want that good. Also, that’s a lot of trust to put on another spirit, and that is something I’m a bit uncomfortable with. Now for perspective I sacrificed a chunk of my life to do the Abramelin as close to the text as was reasonable just to get an Asshole In My Head, and I don’t wholly and blindly trust them. I believe a certain Entity/God/Whatever literally made my Soul, and I wouldn’t wholly and blindly trust them. I have a Yidam, who is supposed to guide me practice, and I wouldn’t wholly and blindly trust them. Do they have my best interest at heart? Sure, but their understanding of it.
My HGA’s interpretation of my best interests might be to burn down my house and force me to wander the city performing chöd or something to push me to enlightenment. Maybe that is my ultimate and universal best, but I’m not ready for that yet. The common analogy is the perspective difference in sports. If you’re in the stands watching a sports game (I don’t care which, they’re all the same to me) or even on TV you have this really big perspective, and can see if someone should do something one way or another. The player on the other hand sees from a smaller perspective, with more things in the way, but they also see the details a lot clearer. So maybe from way up it looks like doing something a specific way, but down on the field the player sees something you don’t, and that means the method you think is best could actually be flawed.
What it boils down to is when people toss out these vague best/better statements it strikes me as indecisive and irresponsible. “What job is the better option?” Well, what are you looking for? What do you value in your work and life? Chances are if you hash that out you won’t need divination to know the job to take, but because you’re indecisive and unclear you’re lost. (Or at least it will redefine what you’re looking for in the questions) Also, and this can be totally judgmental, but some people think it’s totally devotional and spiritual to toss up their hands and say “Whatever my god wants,” but to me that’s just passing the buck. Your life sucks, blame your god, they want you there, your life is awesome, thank your god, they want you there. I don’t deny this can happen, but there is a reason you incarnated into a realm of freewill (okay, maybe not really, but a semblance of it most of the time) and your god didn’t (at least directly). That’s for you to live, to make choices. Or when you claim your god won’t let something happen because it’s against your “highest good” that puts the responsibility on them, not you. Didn’t get that job you applied to, I guess it wasn’t your highest good, not the fact that you’re woefully unqualified or wore your vintage Rolling Stones shirt to the interview. Oh, your spell didn’t work, must not have been your god’s will…not the fact that you might have lacked focus, will, energy, understanding or anything like that. Highest good, and best options, while I don’t deny these on a conceptual level, I feel they’re used more as an excuse to think/act certain ways.
If you’re a magickal person of some sort, I think you owe it to yourself to stop being indecisive, and call the shots in your life.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
05
Sep
2014

Grave Dirt: Bring Up Your Dead


I was asked on the Book of the Face how I collect dirt, and one on hand it’s really easy, do it however you want, on the other hand, if it’s not something you do I guess it’s helpful to know how others do it, so I thought I’d explain that.
There are (in the system I work with) three basic types of dirt: Grave dirt, Nest dirt, and Goal dirt. (I guess, last one was never named. Also there is Graveyard dirt, which is somewhat like Nest dirt, though elements of the other two now that I’m thinking about it)
The one most occult folks focus on is grave dirt. Whether it is a family member, a famous person, a spirit ally, or random grave, there are lots of uses for the dirt, which I won’t get into here, let’s stick with method. (Also, I reached my word limit talking about Grave dirt, I guess that’s the only one we’ll look at now, but hey, at least Goal dirt is already written, so you’re guaranteed a post on that)

My kit: Incense, lighter, spoon, containers with labels, and cigarettes, all stored in a zipper sandwich bag

My kit: Incense, lighter, spoon, containers with labels, and cigarettes

To collect grave dirt you need three simple things: offerings, a container, and a spoon. Being how I am I actually have a ritual spoon for this…and by that I mean one that I’ve only ever used for dirt collection and I keep in my backpack at all times. In fact, all three things in my bag at all time. (They didn’t used to be, but some spirits I’m dealing with have me doing a lot with dirt right now…)
The offering is a bit subjective. If you know the person it could be something appropriate to them. When collecting dirt from my Grandma’s grave I took her vodka and a cigarette, cause that’s what she liked. For my other Grandma I’d take flowers, specifically chicory, dandelions, or anything else that grows on the side of the road. For a soldier you could take toy weapons, poppies, whatever. A lot of people offer coins, and mention the Greek tradition of leaving coins for the ferryman. Personally, I think that is fairly silly. Sure, it worked in Greek culture, and pagans who still follow it would appreciate it, but my Grandma would look at me like I was a goof if I thought two quarters would be a good offering. (But being my Grandma she’d take it and thank me I’m sure) I get the reason, I just think it’s too esoteric for most people. If you don’t know the person, or don’t know what they’d like the big five offerings you can give become water, food, incense, candles, and energy.
Approach the grave, centre and still yourself for a moment, just let the world drop behind you a bit, and then set out the offering on or beside the grave. Depending on your skill/inclinations you can either just talk out loud to the spirit, or actually do a bit more work to call them up. On a simplified level I usually put my left hand on the ground and project a tendril into the earth until I find the urn or casket or a sense of presence, then feeding a bit of energy down that line I draw them up, gently asking that the join me, or at least communicate with me. (The latter is because some really like to be rooted in their remains and would rather talk from below than on the surface, I don’t know why, I didn’t expect it until I encountered it)
Give them the offering. If you know how you can either multiple it, or shape it. The advantages to water, incense, and to a lesser extent candles is they’re fairly good at taking the “imprint” of offering visualizations. So if you create a visualization of an offering water/incense/candles are a good way to ground that offering in our reality and keep it stable. Energy is of course even more malleable, you can offer it however you want, I use a variation of a Shinto method. I clap three times, loudly, but not too hard, but enough to make a clear sound. With the first clap I see the sound clearing away discordant energies, the second more fully calls the spirit into the place, the last is a welcome announcement ‘ah you’re here.’ Then I rub my palms together and hold out my hand as if I was holding a ball in my hands. Aside from the meanings of the clapping, by clapping and rubbing your hands you bring blood, and thus energy, to the surface of your hands, which you can then naturally let pool in the bowl of your hands, or you can will it out.
Now that they have been called, and given the offering you can actually talk with them more directly. This is totally up to you; do you just think it, or speak it, do you chit chat or get straight to business? While thinking works, I find the vocalization carries more energy to them, so the messages are more clear, and oddly so are their responses, and at least in a cemetery talking to a grave isn’t unusual. Explain to them that you’re going to take a portion of their land/grave (my grandmother calls her grave her “property”), and if you have a specific request/intent you can explain that, or you can just explain it’s for connecting with them. Wait to see if they agree, depending on your level of communication they might say it, or you might get a sense of yes/no, if you can’t even get that ask for a small sign “If it’s yes touch my right hand, if it is not touch my left.” If it’s a yes, just take a spoon of the dirt, and you’re good. Usually I touch the dirt first and say something like “This is the spot I’m taking if you would bless it for me” to just draw their resonance into it a little more. If it’s a no, either give up, and thank them, or see if you can convince them, maybe they want another offering, maybe they want you to visit more often (yes Grandma…) or something, sometimes it’s a firm no, other times there might be some negotiation.
Put it in your contain, seal it, and label it. (Okay, I label them, because I don’t use all the dirt at once in many cases and don’t want them getting mixed up, and I occasionally grab samples from more than one place in a day, and again don’t want to confuse them.)

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
02
Sep
2014

Ganzfeld: Blindfolding Your Way to Vision


There is one toy/technique I love, that I don’t use nearly enough: The Ganzfeld procedure. For those unfamiliar with it I’ll explain it briefly, and if you’re curious I’d recommend a bit of time with google for more detailed instructions.
To do the procedure you need a light defusing mask. The classic “mask” here is a ping pong ball cut in half placed against the eyes. The shape of the half-sphere, and the white plastic cause the light to scatter as it passes through, meaning everywhere you look against the inside of the ball is just vague undifferentiated whiteness. I personally use a thick paper mask, like the paper you’d get in sketch book, part way to being cardstock. The mask is cut out like a sleeping mask, and around the edges is glued stretched out cotton balls, so the mask sits about a centimeter above the skin. This framing with cotton balls also allows the mask to completely touch the skin so no light gets in except through the paper, then just staple elastics to the side so you can wear it. The paper will defuse the light in a similar way. Then you need some headphones, and a device that plays white noise, and any Smartphone can grab an app for that.

You too could look this good

You too could look this good

Sit down somewhere comfy, or lay down (though that makes it easier to fall asleep), start the white noise, put on the mask, stop moving and fidgeting, and just let go. Your eyes will struggle to find something to focus on, let them try initially, there shouldn’t’ be anything other than whiteness with no distinguishing features, after minute or so blink your eyes, focus on one spot, and relax. Eventually your eyes will unfocus as they get tired, and then you’re on your way.
What this does is put you in a state of sensory deprivation, not as good as a full chamber for it will do, but it gets the job done. What happens is without any clearly defined sound (thanks to the white noise), or anything clearly defined in your vision (thanks to the mask and your eyes getting tired), your mind kinda…panics? It knows it should be hearing something, it should be seeing something, but it isn’t, so it starts to fill in the gap and then you start hallucinating.
I hear you say “Now Kalagni, this is a mechanically produced hallucination; surely this isn’t useful for magick?”
To which I reply “Who are you, and how did you get into my head?! Also, of course it is useful, if used mindfully.”
Think of it like anything people use, on purpose or accidently for altered states and visions. Sleep deprivation, drugs, exhaustion, even dreams. All of these can cause visions that are completely “mundane” or mental, just images and concepts dragged out of your brain, nothing magickal or objective. True, perhaps, but they can all be focused. If you can keep your mind aware and in control, you can use any of these things to access a magickal experience.
If you go into the Ganzfeld with a specific goal, and keep your awareness focused on a specific end, it can be of great use. So what can you use it for? Well, anything visual/visionary to start. If I need to Look at a client and see what’s going on in their Spheres, I’ll probably sit down with the setup and when I feel reality fall apart, rather than letting my brain ramble and run the show, I direct my Vision toward that person and see what is going on. I use it to scry when I’m having difficulty, usually I’m fairly good, but if I can’t reach a person or place, sometimes this helps get over the hurdle. I know some people have used it to access past lives, that’s not how I work, but it’s another option. You can use it to communicate with spirits in a more intense way. In general it helps you clear out the distractions of sight and sound, so your spiritual senses can be more focused.
It works a bit differently for different people, but for me just before I start hallucinating a black-blue circle appears in the centre of my vision and slowly expands into the whiteness. When this happens this hole in my vision is my Gateway, I project my purpose onto/into it, make it link to the person or place, I might speak a small evocation “Before me opens the Void to Sheta, by Eerah is it opened, by Saytaraan it welcomes me,” whatever, and then I project my mind into the black-blue, and I’m off to wherever.
The thing to be wary of is having this become a technique you can’t operate without. If you can’t scry or communicate with spirits without this you’re going to have a problem. If you can’t scry or talk with spirits, this could help get you started, but you should pay attention to how it happens, what you feel, what the process is, and then work to recreate it without the setup.
The thing that I love about this technique though, is it is relatively simple (the hardest part is making the mask), it’s fairly quick to use (I think it takes about 5 minutes to start hallucinating for me), but it’s also really intense if done right. So really if you’re looking for something to experiment with, you could probably make this setup with stuff you have around the house, in less than 20 minutes, and be scrying in another 5.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick
30
Aug
2014

Labels: Goldilocks and the Sorcerer

I’ve always had an issue with labels; how to label myself, and my practice. On a personal level I dealt with trying to explain a gender identity, which during my late teens just didn’t have a convenient label (and would end up with me telling small lectures to explain things), and it wasn’t until my late twenties that terms like gender-queer came into usage, and in my thirties the term non-binary arose. Sexuality was the same issue, sure bisexual worked, but it missed out on a few things, and again wasn’t until years later in my mid-twenties I found a word more appropriate for me in pansexual.

Magickally I’ve floundered on these things too. Like all labels, I wouldn’t feel compelled to use them if not for shorthand discussions with people. Every forum, every convention, every conversation, as an occultist you get asked something like “What are you?/What do you practice?” Granted I have labels I can and do use, but they’re often narrow and imprecise. Over the years I would have said: energy worker, occultist, magickian, Buddhist, ceremonialist, shamanic inspired, fate-fucker, but none of them ever really fit.

I never felt comfortable with the term pagan, sure, I might believe in the existence of some of the same gods as pagans, but I wasn’t one. My path wasn’t about these gods, or “the old ways,” or whatever. My path was about exploring, experimenting, and doing magick. The fact gods might exist was periphery information, in much the same light as the fact that a Taco Bell three cities over might exist. Witch was much the same, with an addition issue around the type of people I’ve encountered in real life who use that term. (My online witch friends are awesome, the offline witches I’ve met…well, I’ll politely say nothing about them)

I often use the term occultist, and I’d argue in some ways that is the closest of the terms, but also problematically the farthest away. It implies something bookish and scholarly, sure, but also passive, armchair, and hidden, which doesn’t work.

(Ceremonial) Magickian it has its flaws, but it works, but it discounts the ecstatic side of my work, the Buddhist elements. I’ve avoided shaman, cause despite having a strong influence of shamanic elements, there is a cultural issue both personally and interpersonally which makes that word tricky.

I often joked that I’m either a Buddhist using Ceremonial Magick, or a Ceremonialist using Buddhist Magick. That has worked more than anything else.

Recently though a term has been worming its way into my usage, for myself and others: Sorcerer.
What makes sorcerer any different?

Remember this?

Remember this?

When I say Buddhist there is the image of people in robes chanting and meditating in a room filled with incense, true. Yet that ignores the Buddhism that has me dancing and drumming in cemeteries, or making demon-traps for exorcisms. And that’s just where Buddhist doesn’t work in terms of Buddhism. (Though it’s a great decoy to give people who couldn’t/wouldn’t understand what I do, they think Buddhist is one thing, I practice it as another.)

When I say Ceremonialist there is an image of …actually again someone in robes, chanting in a room filled with incense, calculating out astrological timing and making sure that the appropriate planetary ingredients are in the incense, again that’s true. This misses the ecstatic contact though, when I don’t call to the Angels, but they Call their Fire into me. This ignores leaving the books behind and following the Will of the Spirits. And again, that’s just were Ceremonialist falls short.
These labels don’t include the fact that both of these traditions are heavily woven together in my practice. Every morning I make offerings according to Buddhist methods to the planetary angel of the day, I sit in anapana meditation before beginning to pray to my HGA, I use phowa to scry, I time sadhanas by planetary influences. These traditions are really one in my life, but there is more to it. My trance methods come out of shamanic traditions from East and North East Asia. My ancestor work, though wholly my own owes a lot to the practices I learned from friends practicing the African diaspora traditions, and the methods of East/South East Asia. The Gods I call to are from India, Tibet, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Mesoamerica, as well as those from modern gnosis. My energy work is modern models.

I know to an extent that everyone’s practice is somewhat eclectic, all traditions are, and modern practioners tend to be more so, and I’m not arguing that mine is any more or less eclectic, or that it’s better or worse in how it manifests. I’m saying that I find naming important, and all of the names I’ve seen and used are half-right at best, but sorcerer is a bit better.

 

I'm fine with this association. Plus google image all the labels I mentioned, sorcerer has the best results

I’m fine with this association. Plus google image all the labels I mentioned, sorcerer has the best results (Which is obviously the defining factor in choosing a label for your Path

When I say sorcerer…well, there are lots of images, but here is the thing, none of them are as strict. Buddhists sit, Ceremonialists read and calculate, Witches dance with spirits, Shamans travel the worlds, but a sorcerer…does any of these. To paraphrase Jason Miller “I use the word sorcerer not for what it means, but for what it doesn’t mean.” It doesn’t have the same cultural image that the other words do. All you know about a sorcerer from the title is that they do magick, fullstop. It doesn’t say the Path is about Divine Worship, or Material Ends, it doesn’t have the sense of High or Low magick, just magick.

I like this. It’s imprecise, but it’s imprecise in a way that is open, rather than one that is closed. I can say I’m a sorcerer, and that leads into a conversation about the elements of my practice. Sorcerer is a term used in a lot of English translations of different traditions, just because it has this open application. The most obvious from a Buddhist perspective being Milarepa and Padmasambhava, both have been called Buddhist sorcerers in English works. On the other hand when I say ceremonialist, my practice is defined, and then the conversation becomes me explaining who that term doesn’t work or fit, how I’m a ceremonialist “yes, but…”. I’ll still say I’m a ceremonialist, but not as a label, but as a facet within sorcerer.

It’s imprecise, but it gives enough detail to get the point across, without restriction any options within it. With all the other labels I’ve felt I’ve had to use them, and explain them away, but with sorcerer I can just let that term be, and clarify specifics. So for now, I guess you can call me a sorcerer, it sits more comfortably with me than labels in my past.

Posted by kalagni in blueflamemagick