More prompted by questions from intelligent friends of mine. This time around, the question is:

I sometimes wonder if magick isn’t really just a glorified self improvement activity. Is magick ultimately just a life philosophy. Or does it involve something more? If so, what?

This dovetails nicely with my last bit on egregore and the created self.

The simple fact is, we just can’t know. At least not in a logical, “here’s the proof” kind of way. Science has already told us we’re wired to believe. Society pulls and pushes us both ways at once on the topic.

As with many magickal things, there is no easy answer that I expect anyone to accept.

But from where I am right now, with my entire past behind me, with the remembered bits of past life behind me and with the flashes of gnosis that I’ve accumulated over my relatively short time here, I have a definite opinion on it.

First, I’m going to limit the discussion to beneficial and non-invasive magick. What many would call “White Magick” or “Good Magick.” This eliminates all practices done to outright harm others, take from or influence them without permission and which put person gain above all else. Effectively, this limits the magick to workings that directly effect only the worker or just put energy “out there” for others to use as they see fit. In most cases, it would also include healing (with permission) and protection workings, but those don’t necessarily come in to play in the discussion I have planned.

Next, I’m going to go ahead and define self-improvement as working toward a certain image we have of who we think we should be. How we come to create that image is a big issue in and of itself (and I’ll touch on that a little near the end of this).

So already we’re dealing in a very limited universe of the self. At this point it should be very clear that magickal workings can be done for self-improvement. But that begs the question can they be more than that?

I firmly believe that they can be and are.

In the cosmology I work within, I believe everything is connected at a very basic level. As such, the positive development of any one part adds to the greatness of the whole. Conversely the damaging of one part diminishes us all to one extent or another. Both are necessary. There must be both birthing and culling. That dynamic equilibrium prevents stagnation as well as over-growth and complete die-out.

This is all tied directly to my personal growth path I have walked.

For a very long time, I put others far ahead of myself. Everything I did was done only for others. All of my own wants and needs were pushed to the side as my sense of self-worth was tied directly to my impact on others–be it positive or negative.

As anyone else who has walked that path can tell you, it eventually leads to only one place. That place is self destruction. It leads there as surely as seeking only to harm others leads there. But it is a much slower path the that end and can stretch on for years, all the while leaving us feeling like we are making sacrifices for the greater good.

The simple fact is, I am no good to anyone if I am dead. That was a hard realization to accept. It did not reconcile well at all with my world-view at the time which was split along the me and them line.

It wasn’t until I was able to take a step back and see the “us” in the big picture that I was able to save myself from destruction.

I am no good to anyone if I am dead. No one is. We are only useful if we grow. We are only useful if we reach out and expand into the world around us. We are only useful if we improve the only person we can improve–ourselves.

Is that magickal in and of itself? Not necessarily. There are many secular, non-magickal philosophies out there that advocate self-improvement. Some use greed to justify it. Some take the much more sensible and sustainable route of of enlightened self-interest.

It is the root of ones desire for self-improvement that can make the process magickal.

For me, that came from the realization and deep sense of belief that we are one.

From that one realization, came my personal dedication to walk a path of service. But a certain amount of service to self is required–not just to meet the challenges one faces, but to see and grasp the opportunities the Universe presents along the way.

Every time we help others, we help ourselves. Every time we help ourselves with an eye toward the good we can do in the future, we help others.

Is there intrinsically “something more” to it? Perhaps. Perhaps not. We can create that meaning, though, if we so choose. And if enough work toward the same created meaning, we can birth it into this world as plainly as the table in front of me.

Magick is a tool for self-improvement just as it is a tool for the improvement of the world around us. Just like any tool, it can be used to build and destroy. Destructive, forceful and self-aggrandizing magick–Black Magick–can harm the practitioner and the community at large. But, as said before, even that has its place in the scheme of things.

It has been said that we sentient beings are the Universes way of finding out about itself. I believe that to be true. We act as agents of discovery–not only on an individual level, but on a Universal one. We are agents of change and growth. As we evolve, so does the Universe as a whole. And as it evolves, so do we.

As above, so below.

It all started nearly a month ago when a friend of mine posed the questions:

01. how does someone come to earn your trust?

02. how long do you need to get to know someone before letting them in on personal information about you?

03. once someone has earned your trust and becomes a trusted friend, what expectations and responsibilities to you and/or the friendship are important to you?

She was deeply contemplating things and her contemplation spurred a brief yet far-ranging discussion between her and I that I have expanded on here. We talked about how we draw relationships to ourselves. We talked about how relationships are learning experiences and how they often get better the more comfortable we are with ourselves. We talked about the challenges inherent in dealing with others and how there is often conflict to test us and teach us.

Most recently, I brought up the idea that we sometimes have to “get our hands dirty” and delve into darker realms to meet force with force. How we have to risk Karmic retribution in order to do what we believe must be done.

There is no question that the world is a violent place. The more in the world it you are, the more likely you are to see that violence first-hand. The more you are willing to risk, the more you are likely to gain. As long as those risks are not haphazard, at least.

It is that risk–that chance that you may be injured or destroyed while progressing along your path–that brings us full circle back to the ideas of Friendship, Openness and Trust.
One of the most counter-intuitive ideas in the spiritual growth process is that sometimes you need to be destroyed in order to grow.

As we go through life, we build constructs around ourselves. We create patterns of thought and action. We build walls to protect us from pain. We grow callouses from the constant irritation caused by the conflict between the spiritual and the mundane.

All of those things can get in the way of our progress. If we do not realize they are there, we can exacerbate the situation by constantly running into them and being set back in our goals. This is a very common problem in the world at large.

If we realize they are there, we can act to change them or find ways to work around or with them. But some things are not easy to see.

Some things, you can’t see because you are too close to them–not being able to see the forest through the trees. Some things we can’t see because accepting them would be too much of a blow to our sense of what is–taking responsibility for my own bad decisions could very well mess up our view of myself as being on top of things. Some things are just beyond our ability to see without help–you can not look at the back of your own head without a mirror.

This is where the people around us come in.

We have already established that we have some power over who enters our life. This becomes all the more important when we realize that the people around us are one of the biggest keys to our own development. We can just as easily be catapulted up and forward as we can be held back and dragged down.

The people we surround ourselves with serve as both mirrors and challengers. As mirrors, they show us a reflection of what we value and how we live our lives. As challengers, they either excel in areas and make us want to keep up with them or need help in areas where we can lend a hand. Both mirrors and challengers help us learn about ourselves and grow.

But mirrors can only reflect what is put in front of them and challengers are useless unless engaged.

It is at this point that the concept of openness comes in to play. The more open we are–with ourselves and with those around us–the better they will reflect and challenge us.

In other words, the more we hide, the less we can see.

Taken in the context of the ever-popular Johari Window, the Unknown quadrant of ourselves is related very heavily to the Facade and Arena quadrants. The Blind Spot quadrant can be reduced by paying very close attention to the people around us–they often see more than we think they do and the Universal law of “Like Attracts Like” is insidiously sneaky when it comes to presenting us with mirrors of ourselves.

There are few reason why we would not let things we know about ourselves be known to those around us. The big reason is fear. We are afraid to open up because it makes us vulnerable. The more people know about is, the deeper they will be able to stab through our armor if they choose to do so. The more people know about us, the more they will be able to predict what we will do and can more more easily beat us to it. The more people know about us, the more they can tell others about us, opening us even wider to attack and competition.

All of that is true. But it is also true that the more we open ourselves to others, the more they can help us and the more we can help ourselves.

It is risky. And it can hurt.

It can even destroy us.

Or, at least, destroy the “us” we are now.

But is that always a bad thing?

If we have shackled ourselves with limiting patterns and walls of protection and calluses that we can feel nothing through, how are we to move forward without destroying all those things? How are we to grow without out-growing who we are now? How are we to embrace the future without letting go of the past?

It is not possible to have it both ways. We can not both grow and stay the same.

John Shedd said, “A ship is safe in a harbor, but that’s not what ships are built for.”

The same is true of us.

Yes, we can be safe. But if you want to be safe, a path of growth is not for you.

A spiritual path of deep development is not easy, painless or smooth. Once you embark on it, you invite danger and hardship into your life.

Why? Because the risks are proportional to the rewards.

The same is true of Friendship.

Love is one of the underpinning powers of the Universe. Friendship–real Friendship–is another form of Love. It is one of those things that give back at least as much as we put in to it–if not more. And while it is true that Friendships sometimes run their course, the impact of those Friendships stays with all involved until the day they die. (And, perhaps, even longer.)

But what if we choose poorly? What if those people we think are our Friends, aren’t? What if we never choose the right people as friends?

If you choose poorly, it is because you are not being honest with yourself or because you are being tested. When we see Friendship where it is not, we are giving in to an illusion. When that illusion is dispelled–when we become truly dis-illusioned–we must look at the reality and try to see they why behind it.

What–aside from “people can be mean”–did we learn about our selves from the relationship? What–aside from an easy target–did we give those others that have hurt us? Do not get caught up in the negative. Reach for the positive lessons learned. They are often far harder to discern and, as such, more important to hold on to.

Fear again plays a role in keeping us from giving. We fear being hurt, and so we do not give. We do not leave our harbor.

Faith is another key component of a spiritual path. Without Faith–without knowing deep in your heart and soul that there is something larger than us out there–there is no reason to seek out deeper knowledge, no reason to challenge ourselves in that particular arena.

Trust is a descendant of Faith. Trust is Faith tempered by experience.

Trust is what we must have in ourselves. We must Trust that we are built strong enough to survive some rough seas. We must Trust that we are capable of growing and changing and adapting. We must Trust that, after enough work, we will get it right–we will be able to find those elusive Friends.

And when we do find them, we must extend that internal Trust to them. If we do not do that, there is less chance of them returning it.

Faith and Love share the same root–the deepest core of the Universe itself. Trust and Friendship can be traced back, too.

Friendship is the most common magickal working you will ever be involved in. It requires work and preparation. It requires Will and determination. It requires the projection of Love and Trust.

In some traditions, when an Initiate first declares themselves, they must pledge to enter the sanctuary in perfect Love and with perfect Trust. They must place themselves in the hands of their fellows and believe deeply that any pain will be necessary and the benefits gained will far outweigh the price paid.

In our everyday lives, we should look at our Friends the same way.

Because in this violent and ever-changing world, there is nothing more valuable than a good Friend to watch your back. That one person is worth a hundred (or more) failed attempts.

A friend of mine asked me the other day what definition of magick I’m running with. He suggested I list three books that influenced my magickal practice the most.

That request isn’t answered quite as easily as one would think.

My path to where I am now was a long and twisted one. My interest in the paranormal came from a very scientific direction. Growing up in the 80s, I regularly saw bits on various television shows about ghosts, aliens and strange abilities. That decade wasn’t too far removed from the New Age movement of the 60s and 70s. I had a lot of time to browse books, but not a lot of places to get books about more esoteric subjects.

Luckily, around the house there some copies of random books to be found with some thought-provoking sections in them (like The World’s Last Mysteries and The People’s Almanac). There were also a few books by Erich von Daniken dealing with gods from outer space. Those books and others like them piqued my interest in strange science and anomalous events. That interest was fed by columns in Omni and Discover magazines that touched on those fringe areas.

Exploring those trains of thought brought me in touch with the concepts of ESP and ghosts and the science of parapsychology. The idea that these strange things could be looked at in a scientific manner–even if the bulk of the “normal” scientists out there scoffed at such things–was eye opening and mind-blowing.

If people could actually see the future or move things with their minds (even if it doesn’t work very well at all under laboratory conditions), at leas there those out there willing to give the events themselves the benefit of a doubt and explore them as rigorously as possible. Doing so without the fluffy trappings of the New Age movement made that exploration even better.

From psi it is not a far leap to magick. Both involve individuals doing things that general knowledge says are impossible. Both involve the manipulation or use of something outside of regular science’s current understanding. Both appear to have been much more commonly accepted in less “enlightened” times. And both, it seems, are here to stay in the popular vernacular no matter what science has to say about it.

And so, my search jumped tracks.

I was raised Catholic. As I grew and studied more in preparation for my Confirmation sacrament, I truly got the sense that there was something out there larger than any of us individually. At that time in my life, that realization hit me very hard and very deeply. It was immediately followed by the realization that, of all the people in my Confirmation class, I was taking the entire experience the most seriously. It was one of the reasons I parted ways with the Church (along with their insistence on sticking their fingers deeply into the temporal world where they have no real business being).
That feeling and realization would happen again a few years later during my Order of the Arrow initiation. Sitting alone in silence in the wilderness at night, with all the modern world faded into a flickering memory, I felt connected. Connected to something bigger. Something more real than the flash and bang of normal living. Something… more important.

Those two experiences, of course, were quickly lost to the noise of every day life as an agsty teenager living during the media explosion and consumer crush of the late 1980s and early 90s. I had my own problems to deal with and those thoughts of things bigger than my own (low) social standing were few and far between.

But there were things that would crop up every now and then.

I told my friend, when he asked about the three books that were most influential, that I know what answers I’d like to give. The answers that would make me sound well-read and methodical in my study. The ones that would make may people scratch their heads and question that such books would even exist–and if they did that anyone could take them seriously. I own books like that. I’ve even read some of them. But they came long after my own beliefs were set.

I told him that the books that influenced me the most were A Wrinkle in Time (and the other books in that series) by Madeline L’Engle, a truly magical work of fiction that blended science and fantasy in a way I had never seen it done before. It put things in perspective. It showed that the fantastical and the mundane could exist and impact one another without one really believing the other existed.

Esp, Hauntings and Poltergeists: A Parapsychologist’s Handbook by Loyd Auerbach was another influential book. I think it may have been the first book I owned that specifically looked at the attempts made to understand the strange and unusual through the lens of science. It laid out technique and told stories of investigations and experiences that, while fantastical in their own right, were believable and verifiable, if not explainable.

Celtic Magic by D.J. Conway served as my major jumping off point from psi to magick. While I now look back and chuckle a bit at the simplicity and generic nature of the book as a whole, the seeds within it still call to me. Western Europe is where my spiritual lineage seems to come from, this book spoke to that and opened doors within my mind that have never ceased to lead to learning.

Over the years there have been many, many other books. And prior influences can be traced to everything from the classic horror films I grew up watching to more recent role playing games and sci-fi television. There are also a handful of books on spiritual subjects that, when I read them, echoes nicely and gave names to the things I had been feeling, knowing and thinking about. I’ll explore some of them in more detail at a later time.
I have been seriously slack in recent years in keeping up with my actual study of things magickal. My personal beliefs are integrated solidly into my way of life and I don’t expect most of them to be what other people. I haven’t had to throw about actual definitions a lot in the past decade. When i do, I often fall back to things I’ve read from Aleister Crowley. While I can’t claim to like the way the man lived his life, I can not question the fact that he was a genious when it came to metaphysical matters.

And so I borrow from definitions often used by Thelemic practitioners, even though I am not one.

Magick is making things happen through intent. In my view, I differentiate it a little bit more by usually only using it to refer to things we make happen through definite action that lacks a scientifically proven casual component. In my deeper theory, it differentiates from psi in what that paranormal component it.

The bottom line is, we all have power. And because we are all connected to everything, we share that power. It is as dynamic and unpredictable and creative and wonderful as it is dangerous and corrupting and destructive. Just like us.

It simply is.

How we understand it is up to us. How we work with it is up to us.

What we do with it is up to us.

The Universe provides, but we must choose.

I’ve made my choices and I am still learning.

That’s really what this journal is about.