Magic is NOT for everyone

Late last night, a person posted, in the Golden Dawn Facebook group that I help moderate, that they and their partner were in the process of creating a new course. This course is to be aimed at a mainstream audience, so it could not be too occult--but they are planning on cherry picking techniques from Golden Dawn and other systems...so essentially the occult would be disguised. And most importantly, the course had to be effective and reliable for the average individual in western society--all in the name of empowerment.

To say I have a few problems with this idea would be understating things. Personally, I think that the whole idea is a giant bag of poo. Here are a couple of comments that I made about it before the entire discussion got deleted (and not by me...I think that the original poster did not like what I had to say about his project):

"My mind keeps coming back to a problem I see with aiming it at the average individual---your average person is averse to change; your average person is averse to work. So unless you are making another "Law of Attraction" level course (most LOA stuff is...well, flawed---the only real work most of it does is to transfer money from the clients pockets to the person running the course), you have to figure out a way to make your average person accept change, and a way to make them actually work at the process."

"Unfortunately, GD methods are full of change and work....so you are probably going to have to lose this part of your course plan if you want your course to appeal to your average individual."

"And yes, if I was to create a course myself, aimed at the average individual, I would not go for anything more than happy New Age talk aimed at confirming that individual's opinion and biases are absolutely correct....because that is the amount of work and change that your average individual is willing to accept---absolutely no work and no change at all. Therefore, all the GD stuff has to be left out....along with the working bits of any other spiritual development system."

When the person shot back that they want to create human beings that think--I merely rolled my eyes...I have seen what passes nowadays as "critical thinking" training (basically if you do not agree with what the creator of the course thinks, you are labelled a troublemaker and showed the door). And I have seen firsthand the lack of actual thinking in this person's own postings on the internet, so I do not hold out high hopes that they can teach something that they themselves seem incapable of doing.

My "polite" parting shot was: "Here is the bottom line---if any of us knew how to accomplish this goal, we would be doing it already. And that includes you--if you knew how to pull this off, you would not be asking for input."

At this point of time, I was declared a defeatist by the other person, who then cited Gandhi, Einstein, and Tesla as people who had vision and had made a difference. It was right after this that I said "I guess that you are the Messiah."

I didn't get to say anything else because someone (and I think that it was the original poster, aka the creator of this "soon to revolutionize humanity" course) deleted the entire discussion.

Seriously, ideas like this worry me. Every course I have ever seen aimed at the masses is nothing more than a control and asset reallotment scheme (think like me, and give me your money! and feel good about yourself for making a difference....in other words, thanks for being gullible and buying me a new jet). And this individual's idea that people who subscribe to courses actually do the work is flawed---just look at the numbers of subscribers that pay for the BOTA course, who do not do a lick of actual work with the course...and that course is about empowerment and change.

No, the only real reason to create an occult course, no matter how watered down, aimed at the masses, Joe Q. Common, is that you are running a scam and want to fleece people of their hard-earned money, so that you do not have to work hard yourself.

If you actually want to make a difference, you aim at those individuals who can and are willing to become exceptional--you do not have to disguise the occult or make them feel good about themselves--and you never mistake them for the common herd.

Yes, magic is for all of you---and God wants you to send me your money because I need a new jet. 

Beltane 2013 (Tarot Blog Hop)

The first Tarot card I ever created. 

Welcome to the Beltane 2013 edition of the Tarot Blog Hop. For those people who are doing the hop, you probably came from Alison Coals' blog. If there has been any problems, you might have came directly from the Tarot Blog Hop Master List. As for my regular readers...well, it is probably a secret where you are coming from (esoteric Order humor--I s*** at it).

The theme of this particular blog hop is "What traditions are important to you in how you read Tarot?"

Now, some of my regular readers have heard me talk about one of my favorite Tarot traditions--which is to make your own Tarot cards. It is a tradition that some in the Golden Dawn has observed; but not all, for the number of surviving handmade copies of the initiated version of the Golden Dawn deck that has surfaced in the historical arena number less than a dozen (or so, I have been led to believe).

When I first joined Golden Dawn, or what passed for GD here in Denver during the 1990s, I was horribly bad at reading Tarot cards--better than some people, but not good enough to rely on them to tell me anything that I did not already know. One of the things that Hathoor Temple insisted that members do during their course work was prove that one could create a Tarot deck (hand make it) if one really had to.

Now, at the time, I was reading a Tarot based story by Pier Anthonys. Some people will recognize the book cover that I based my Death card on, and perhaps even the fact that I borrowed more than just that. The interesting thing is that, despite my nerdish leanings in my initial Tarot creation, the exercise worked. I became better at reading Tarot cards. I never did complete that first Tarot deck, but the point was proven to me that making your own Tarot cards helps you build a connection to the spirit of the Tarot.

Color your own Death card in Golden Dawn.

One of the problems with creating your own Tarot deck is that you might not have enough artistic skill to comfortably do the task. This problem may be why so few decks have survived. Or like in my case, the requirement was done with just a handful of cards.

BOTA, an esoteric Order in the United States, an offshoot of the Alpha and Omega, came up with a solution where the student did not completely create their own Tarot deck. The BOTA deck is a "color it yourself" Tarot deck; many in Golden Dawn seemed to have gone with that option. From a Golden Dawn viewpoint, the BOTA deck is not completely right (it is based more on the A.E.Waite/Pamela Smith deck than the initiated GD version); a point that was addressed a decade ago with the creation of a limited edition Golden Dawn version of a outline deck...which unfortunately is out-of-print to the best of my knowledge (not that you can't find and print out the whole thing from your computer with the help of a simple Google search).

Making your own Tarot deck is the one Tarot tradition that I insist on inflicting on all the students that I teach...because it worked for me. It is the cornerstone to how I teach the Tarot. Besides everyone loves to paint and color by number--and if they don't, well, I am quite sure that they will not tell me so to my face.

(And yes to the person who asked--eventually I did end up doing an entire Tarot deck by hand for the Inner Order Adept Minor program that I did a couple of years ago.)

For those who are continuing with the Tarot Blog Hop, the next stop is Aisling's Tarot Witchery Blog. As always if there is any problems, you can jump over any broken links by consulting the Tarot Blog Hop Master List. As for my regular readers, you probably should get back to work. Until next time, keep shuffling those Tarot cards.

777 Book of Correspondences

This is my 777th blog post, so today I chose to talk about (drum roll please)...777.

777 is Aleister Crowley's expanded and modified version of the Golden Dawn document known as The Book of Correspondences. Just like the guide sheet for the creation of Godforms seems to have been restricted to the office of Hierophant, the Book of Correspondence seems to been restricted to the office of Praemonstrator. This is not to say that other members did not know of its existence. Parts of it was spoon-fed to the students of the system in the Knowledge Lectures of the various Grades. By the time that one was an Adept Minor, one had a large part of the Book of Correspondences available to them. Inside the Order, one could assemble the known parts that were circulated among the Knowledge Lectures, and add to it, making a personal copy of the document (much like the members of BOTA end up with a Book of Numbers--think Sepher Sephiroth). Or at least, that is the way I understand the extent of its circulation among the Order.

Crowley was most likely working from Allen Bennett's personal copy. Today, most ceremonial magicians own a copy issued though Weiser. I brought my copy back in September 1994; it is now held together with packing tape. I filled a couple of hardbound journals with some additional material that I mapped to the paths of the Tree of Life.

777 was not the first set of correspondences to be published. Agrippa and several magical calendars predate Crowley's publication, as do some materials focused on astrology. But I will admit that for organization, Crowley is the winner.

In recent times, there have been several books that have expanded the possibilities of information to be included in one's personal copy of the Book of Correspondences. These include The Magician's Companion: A Practical Encyclopdic Guide to Magical & Religious Symbolism (Bill Whitcomb) and The Magician's Tables: A Complete Book of Correspondences (Alan Richardson).

The best expansion of 777 (at this time) is Stephen Skinner's The Complete Magician's Tables. Not all the tables in Skinner's work agree with Crowley's--but that is ok. And I love randomly googling names from his Uniform Timeline.

Needless to say, my favorite version is my own. I think most working magicians and witches would say the same. After all, it is the version that corresponds exactly with the associations that I use in my own personal magical workings.

Internal polarity of the Tarot Cards

If you are doing the Tarot Blog Hop, odds are that you have arrived from Tarot Notes by Zanna Starr, a nice blog which uses cards from many Tarot decks---for those of us who are always looking for more Tarot decks to buy. And if you are a regualr reader, the post is about a Tarot spread based on an Easter Egg.

The prompt for today (tommorrow) Ostra's Tarot Blog Hop is Paint a journey with new life. It was hard not to think of the "coloring the Tarot" exercise that I have done in the course of my Adept Minor ZAM training (Zelator Adept Minor--one of the subgrades that some Golden Dawn Orders use) when presented with this prompt. And being the lazy New Age Adept that I am, I figured "Why not?"

A rough draft of the Wheel of Fortune as colored by the RR et AC.

Now, I will be the first to admit that my results should be buried under a rock. My cards are not the world's prettiest; they are also not the most true when you look at the basis of the color scheme--the color scales of the RR et AC (the original Inner Order of the Golden Dawn, not to be confused with any of the modern Second Orders of the esoteric schools that call themselves Golden Dawn today). For instance, the Wheel of Fortune should be colored (according to my favorite set of scale sheets) with the colors violet, blue, rich purple, and bright blue rayed with yellow. Even my color blind Dad would have been able to see that my colors are slightly (or greatly) off the mark.

The polarities of the Wheel of Fortune card--according to the least reliable GD authority--me!

Even more suspect are my private non-canon, non-approved coloring experiments where I just toss out the traditional colors and do whatever I feel like doing. (Suspect in the sense that they are not even remotely what my mentor wanted me to turn out.) One of the coloring experiments that I have indulged in is to attempt to figure out the internal polority of the individual Tarot cards.

To understand why the internal polarity of a card matters, one must remember that in Golden Dawn ritual, the Temple is often symbolic (taking place in the location) of one of the Tarot cards. The projecting, neutral, and recieving (or positve, neutral, and negative if you prefer) parts of the card would in theory reflect into the space that the initiation is being done in. To figure out the parts would be a hint of what is going on in the lodge room during the initation. (Initiation equals a new stage of life and another step on the journey of spiritual development--smart I am, right?)

There would also be a bleed-over when reading the Tarot cards--the part that leaps out at you during a reading could be read in terms of polarity. For instance, if the first thing that leaps out at you during a reading is passive, there is a good chance that the energies of the card are manifesting themselves in that way in the client's life.

Now, one of the more easier cards to figure out the polarity for is the Wheel of Fortune (GD/RR et AC version). As I have colored it here, red represents the projecting element of the card (the sphinx), the neutral part is yellow (the wheel itself), and the recieving element is blue (the monkey). These are the basic zones of the card.

Actually, it may not be as simple as that. All three of these parts can be further subdivided, for they are comprised of symbols that add another layer to the polarity play of the card. For instance, the wheel's spokes actually represent the 12 zodiac signs; therefore, there are both positve and negative elements that comprise the neutral part of the card.

Of course, I do not need to tell my regular readers to take this idea with a large grain of salt. This idea is not gospel, rather it is suggestive only. After all, we all know that I got my Golden Dawn certificate out of a cracker jack box and my training in the back of a coffee shop. Ironically, according to some, that makes me the equal of most Golden Dawn leaders and teachers...in which case, feel free to take this as gospel (heavens knows that I am going to inflict it on the members of my own lodge).

If you are continuing with the Tarot Blog Hop, you are now going to head over to Johanna Powell Colbert's blog (she is the creator of the Gaian Tarot). Her post is also about an Easter Egg Tarot Spread--obviously, I am the odd one in this particualr Blog Hop.

[This post was updated on 21 March 2012 with the permanent web links to the Tarot Blog Hop blogs that preceeded and followed mine.]

Being a Better Candle (Tarot)

This post is part of the Tarot Blog Hop/Blog Round Robin for Candlemas 2012.

Therefore, some of you just got done reading Michael Banuelos' Modern Day Oracle blog.

The rest of you are wondering what a Tarot Blog Hop/Blog Round Robin is. Basically, it is a group of bloggers who agreed to blog loosely about the same topic today and link their posts in a circle. Today's topic is Being a Better Candle (Tarot).

Tommorrow is Imbolc. Or Inbolg. Or Oilmec. Or Brighid's Day. Or Candlemas. Or St. Bridget's Day (Jesus' nurse and foster mom). Or Groundhog's Day.

Or as I like to call it---Why do I have candle wax on my Tarot cards Day. And don't laugh---I actually do have candle wax on several of my Tarot decks. The reason for this is that I sometimes do Tarot readings in the full Golden Dawn ritual envirnoment. For those who are in the Blog Tour, the Golden Dawn was a teaching organization in its Outer Order (first five stages/Grades) and a working magical system in its Inner Order (RR et AC). The techniques of the Golden Dawn were borrowed from the French and English occultists of its day (1880s and 1890s), were further developed by its membership, and then passed down the line (Aleister Crowley, A. E. Waite, Pamela "Pixie" Colman Smith, Paul Foster Case). If you read the Tarot, odds are that you have been influenced by the Golden Dawn...often without knowing it.

Now, I personally believe that the Golden Dawn lore and RR et AC methods have made me a better Tarot reader. I don't use the methods all the time---in fact, it is impossible to use the methods all the time, especially if you ever do public readings---but the lore is always in the back of my mind.

The method that has helped me the most is hand-coloring my own Tarot deck. The lodge that I first joined required its members to create a few cards; for me, this exercise helped me create a better connection to the cards (I was a pretty lousy Tarot reader before that point). BOTA, Case's esoteric school, issues a outline version of the Tarot cards for its members to handcolor. Briefly, there was a Golden Dawn deck that one could do the same with (alas, I believe that it is out of print now). The current lodge I belong to requires the initiate to hand-color a deck in the Grade of Adept Minor (using either a bootleg of the GD deck, a BOTA deck, or another outline deck).

There are other methods in the Golden Dawn system that positively affect one's ability to read the Tarot cards; which method helps the most will vary from person to person. The Z operation (basically, you do a full ritual with the divination in the center of the process), godform assumption, pathworkings...I am probably forgetting something...the Grade initiations themselves, all of these things can help make a better Tarot reader. Of course, there is also the fact that one often (not always) ends up working with other people in the Order exchanging readings and information about the Tarot.

Originally, all these methods were kept under the lock and key of Hermetic secrecy. Today, most of the methods are general knowledge among advanced Tarot readers. (Ok, there are a few things still secret...but let's be honest, the information that has slipped into the public has spread far and wide.) Whether this is a good thing or not depends upon how much you desire to keep people ignorant. Personally, as someone who is worried about the state of the world, I think that we need all the information that we can get to safely navigate through the torrents of modern times. And if that information comes from people using the Tarot---so be it.

In my case, I try to be a better candle by doing the occasional Tarot reading and teaching the Golden Dawn and Inner Order methods to a small circle of people. Whether this actually makes me a better person, a harbringer of the Light, is anyone's guess. But one does what one can, and crosses their fingers, hoping for the best.

So what working method have you found most useful working with the Tarot? And do you believe that information about various methods should be shared? Or should they be kept secret?

(All comments are read, but I reserve the right to not publish the worst comments.)

Blessed be on this Why do I have candle wax on my Tarot cards Day.

For those who are reading the Tarot Blog Hop/Blog Round Robin, the next stop on the Tarot blog tour is October's blog, Readings by October, and she is hella funny.

Quote of the day: Case on the potential of meditation

Randomly reading Paul Foster Case's Wisdom of the Tarot (The Golden Dawn Tarot Series 1), I ran across today's quote on mediation. Case writing about the Star says:

Aquarius is jointly ruled by Uranus and Saturn. These two are the first and last Keys of the Tarot Major Trumps, The Fool and The World. This is a sufficient hint that the practice of meditation will eventually bring about the answers to every question, from the most abstract to the most concrete. There are many other interesting ideas arising out of this co-rulership. See if you can follow some of them out by meditating upon them.

How to cope without your favorite Tarot deck

Late last night (or was it really early this morning), I was reading posts on a Golden Dawn Forum. Other people count sheep when they can not sleep; I browse for occult ideas.

One of the posts mentioned the (Lady) Frieda Harris/Aleister Crowley Thoth deck (English editions) was apparently out of print, and commanding high prices on the internet. This was news to me. Going over to Amazon and Google, I quickly learned that the poster was right. (English language) Thoth decks are going for a hundred dollars a pop at the moment.

For myself, this is not a big concern. I lean towards cards that do not overwhelm a client; I prefer using short explainations about the symbolism of Tarot, and the Thoth deck is a deep one. I own one for study purposes, but it is not used as heavily as other decks in my collection.

(All the professional and most of the semi-professional Tarot readers I know have several decks that they read with. Someday, I will blog about the reasons for this behavior.)

So in my case, I imagine that the deck will be back in print before I need to replace mine. But for some students and readers, they would like to be able to replace their decks right now without having to spend a hundred dollars or more.

(One of the basic economic rules of occultism is that out of print books and Tarot decks fetch outrageous prices. Even the most useless occult book or Tarot deck will cost you a hundred dollars or more. A high price on an out of print occult book or Tarot deck is no indication of the item's actual merit.)

Or at least, I presume that it will be back in print within the next couple of years.

(There are both economic and copyright issues that could complicate the situation, delaying a reissue of the deck for longer than I am estimating.)

So how does one cope with the unavailability of one's favorite Tarot deck?

One can simply do without it. This is what the poster has been doing. This may or may not be acceptable depending upon one's personal preferences. Especially if one does not have a strong link with a different variation of the Tarot.

Most modern occult students today (or at least the younger ones) do not realize how spoiled we are today; we have an overwhelming wealth of books and Tarot decks. We have choices in what to buy when we need (or simply want) a new Tarot deck or book.

This has not always been true. Even thirty years ago when I was a teenager edging into the occult and wicca, my choices were much more limited. And when my aunt entered the field a couple of decades earlier, the choices were just a couple of Tarot decks (and they had to be imported).

As for the Thoth deck itself, it was twenty-five years after it was designed by Harris and Crowley before it was actually issued. That is 1969 for those who are reading this instead of counting sheep.

Going back in time, the members of the original Order of the Golden Dawn had two choices when it came to the Tarot deck that they used. They could either paint their own, or they could buy a Tarot deck imported from Italy or France.

Substition or doing without is a long tradition among occult students, especially the initiated.

In the case of the Thoth deck, one might be able to obtain one printed in a different language. Maybe.

If your beloved Tarot deck is not too tattered, one can attempt to repair it. Or at least, attempt to prevent further damage. I remember one of the members of Hathoor Temple had a deck of cards that were laminated. It is hardly ideal, but one can understand the thought behind it.

Making your own Tarot deck is still an option today. In some cases, you might not even need art skills, just access to a good printer, a boatload of ink, some glue and cardstock. For those who are attempted to experiment doing it with the Thoth deck, one should note that I have encountered an entire set of jpegs of the Thoth deck on the internet.

The set of jpegs is also useful for the ultimate initiated answer of dealing with the unavailability of a Tarot deck.

I mentioned earlier that I lean towards using a simple (non-initiate) Tarot deck when I am doing readings for others. (Except of course, for members of our tradition, who get the full song and dance.) What I did not mention was the fact that the cards I lay on the table are not neccessarily the cards I see when I am doing the reading.

One of the things that we do as initiates in the esoteric Orders is to build up our visualization skills; we also make the symbolism of the Tarot (and other symbol systems) a part of our "mental furniture". Professional Tarot readers also do this.

There are many reasons why we do this. One of the side benefits of developing this skill set is that you can be doing a reading in a coffee house using a light Tarot deck as your physical prop; and in your mind, visualizing and reading from the initiated Golden Dawn Tarot or the Thoth deck.

The moral of all this is that with a little imagination, we can cope with our favorite Tarot deck falling out of print.

Danger from Enochian

One of the things that you hear about Enochian magic is that it is dangerous. Most of this seems to stem from the belief of Paul Foster Case that it was dangerous to use; in fact, while the rituals of the Builders of the Adtyum are remarkably similar to Golden Dawn's, they do not have any Enochian contained in them.

Now, I am not sure that Enochian is death causing, but I am sure that it is dangerous---or at least, it is dangerous for me to practice.

I am doing another round of Enochian scrying to fulfill the requirements of the subGrade that I am currently working on. And one thing that I have noticed about the work is that it leaves me mentally and emotionally off-balanced.

I first started to notice this when I realized that some of my nastier responses on the GD forums were done after doing Enochian scrying. It is very easy to annoy me the day after I do a scrying. Doing a full set of banishings after the scrying session helps, but still my tongue is wicked and my brain is unwell after scrying an Enochian square.

I know the square that puts me back into the mindset I used to have in food service; you know that nasty one where you suspect that the cook is about to go postal on someone. If I didn't have to scry it to pass my examinations, I would go near it ever again.

Essentially, I think that the problem with that particular square, and with the majority of the squares is that they are not complete elementally. And add a mind that was programmed in childhood by a lot of abuse, and you end up with an uncomfortable, if not slightly dangerous, combination.

So while I have doubts about the Enochian system being able to just kill someone mysterious, I do know first-hand that working with them is like subjecting your brain to a chemical bath. If you find the right square, it would probably help. But considering that for the most part, there is little published yet about the mental effects of most of the squares, it is like gambling in a drug den.

Or at least for me, it sure seems that way. But then again, I am one of the people that working with the Golden Dawn system has actually helped improve the mental stability of. My proof? At one time, I wouldn't have even noticed the effect of the squares I am scrying.

At least, I am improving.

So if working with Enochian is helping me, why do I consider it dangerous?

Well, it is not the system itself that seems to be the biggest problem (though I prefer more elemental balanced systems) rather it is the people who are attracted to it. You know the ones: people who have skipped though the Outer Order work, or moved the Enochian to Outer Order, or insist that the Enochian is the crown jewel of Golden Dawn and that they are not stooping down to do anything of less importance (ego issues, it is called), or decided that they are going to do a different square every day for 156 days straight. In short, put lunacy in and you are going to get lunacy out.

For these people, it is the goal that is important; to arrive at the peak is the only important thing. To them, people like me who are taking our sweet time doing the work are the ones that have it all wrong. People like me think that we have a lifetime to do the work and as long as we are continuing to put one foot in front of the other, it does not matter how slow we are working.

Eventually I am going to get to the goal. After all, I have plenty of time to get there. And I would like to have some of my marbles left when I get there. So I think that I won't do more than one Enochian scrying in any given week, just because the system seems to make my temper worse for wear.