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Weak Magic(k)

  
 
Medicine God
12:04 / 01.04.04
There is a trend in Chaos Magick in which the practitioner doesn't do any real exercises to speak of (aside from the sickeningly inane) and from which recieves little more than a warm fuzzy feeling inside augmented by a giggle at all the foolish people testing the credibility of the arcane. The logic being: "If its not immediately accessible, it is worthless", some call it 'intuitive magick', I call it more masturbation of the ego.

I have a feeling if this is offensive to you then you may want to reevaluate your stuff.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
12:13 / 01.04.04
Am I the only person who doesn't understand what the point of this thread is?
 
 
trouser the trouserian
12:15 / 01.04.04
How d'you know it's a trend? Have you done a poll or something?
 
 
macrophage
12:39 / 01.04.04
What constitites real git ard exercises then? I'm doing my Liber MMM just now. Yer not talking about not moving for 8 hours are you and then recording the results or sommat like that, or pumping iron and remodifying our bodies like in Tetsuo 2????
 
 
Medicine God
12:51 / 01.04.04
I know its a trend, because I see more and more people latching onto that method of thought.

The definition of magick is expandable to the point where any activity could be defined as such, but I was thinking along the lines of chanting sappy affirmations in your head while washing dishes. This is the same crap that happened to Jeet Kune Do users, they sacrifice depth for ease of use, and still claim to be martial artists, which while not technically untrue, they tend be rather lacking in any real expertise.
 
 
Medicine God
12:52 / 01.04.04
[[[Am I the only person who doesn't understand what the point of this thread is?]]]

Its part rebuke and part venting of bitter resentment. Its satisfying.
 
 
illmatic
13:06 / 01.04.04
I understand what you mean to a degree, I think (see "sigls are boring" thread). Chaos Magic can come across a bit "bite size". But I'm quite wary about laying into other's paths*, as I know I probably don't fully understand what they're doing or what they're going thrrough. Who's to say I'm not being really dull, boring and formulaic? Can I match the excited tremors of a shaking newbie, Liber Null in one hand, "wand" in the other?

So what do you do then? What's your main area of focus? how is it "better"? (Meant to reply to your other thread on acceptance but have no time today).

*(that's a total lie actually, I'm happy to c**t pople off till the cows come home if it suits my arguement).
 
 
trouser the trouserian
13:18 / 01.04.04
Why such bitter resentment Medicine God?
 
 
The Prince of All Lies
16:25 / 01.04.04
I'm sure there are some people who are like that... I consider myself a chaos magick practitioner because I agree with its premises and I'm working everyday on the basic exercises of the Liber MMM. I'm not an Archmage or whatever, but I consider myself a Chaos Magician (or mage, magickian or whatever, choose your favorite etimology) because I intend to be one. As Carroll said, "Fake it Till You Make It".
 
 
eddie thirteen
18:40 / 01.04.04
Um, first of all, I think this may be an April Fool's joke, the point of which being to piss people off. Anyhow, I hope so, because otherwise it seems very juvenile and bitter. I mean, how the fuck can you even know what other people do in their own magical practices unless they tell you? And, y'know, really, I think most people are unlikely to tell somebody who seems this prone to being judgmental. I mean, what are you, dude, the R. Lee Ermey of mysticism? "Put down that sigil and drop your cock, FAGGOT!! I want to see some genuine motherfucking mystical shit happen in here, not some mamby-pamby momma's boy meditative horseshit! Let me ask you, how exactly do you intend to chant your mantra with your loverboy's cock in your mouth?!" Et cetera.

More importantly, I think...um...well, with the new layout I can't see anybody's name, but you (you know!) -- do you mean Tetsuo II, or do you mean Tokyo Fist? Both by the same director, but the latter's the one I associate with pumping iron and stuff.
 
 
Frank Fress
18:55 / 01.04.04
Who the fuck cares? I practice magick as an effort to concentrate my will, not to live up to a standard set by some self-righteous uber-magus. We are all searching for personal growth and gain and the thing to remember is that this is PERSONAL. If you hold any "bitter resentment" about the methods of others or Choas Magick "trends", you're taking it all a little too seriously mate. Maybe the other practitioners aren't the ones with the problem eh?
 
 
macrophage
19:39 / 01.04.04
At the end of the day if you dare to do you do.
 
 
---
19:55 / 01.04.04
There is a trend in Chaos Magick in which the practitioner doesn't do any real exercises to speak of (aside from the sickeningly inane) and from which recieves little more than a warm fuzzy feeling inside augmented by a giggle at all the foolish people testing the credibility of the arcane.

It's the same with other types of magic aswell, probably all of them. I don't know why you single Chaos Magick out.
 
 
---
20:16 / 01.04.04
Damn typo in that last post.

Anyway seeing as i'm here, i don't know what the big thing is about Chaos Magick and problems with it. You can't just pin the whole thing down and say 'there is a trend' because you have to admit that you don't know. Chaos Magick is one of the most free, spontaneous things you can work with. It's not about wanking, Cthulhu, Shoggoth's and sigils at it's essence, it's about freedom of choice and being creative. It's an artform in the sense that your free to create concepts/systems and ideas just to see if it works and if it doesn't you can dump it and try something else.

It's fucking dangerous aswell, maybe why it gets so much stick. It's literally 'Chaos' in the system forming it's own fluid system as and when it sees fit, at the control of nothing that can be desribed in neat terms or illusions, maybe that just worries other schools of Magick. I'm not trying to say that it's better than any other systems or that other sytems of Magick are safe, but there's no single path with signposts on it telling you what to do, you have to use your intuition, your forced to use your intuition, but that's what makes it so good.

Life is the exercise with Chaos Magick, how can the practitioner not be doing anything?
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
20:19 / 01.04.04
What would you consider a sickeningly inane excercise, Medicine God? And what excercises would you recommend as worthwhile?

I think the tendency you note is probably more common amongst the very new to magick (say, less than six months), though by no means universal. You may also be seeing more of this "trend" on the internet than exists in real life, simply because the average age of internet users is so low.
 
 
Colonel Kadmon
21:04 / 01.04.04
While I don't agree with Medicine God entirely, I sort of egree with some of what is said. In traditional forms of Magic, it's pretty clear when you're committed or not - you're either practicing, or you're not. Chaos magic gives a way around any actual practice per se by allowing the magician to define magic and magical practice as sHe sees fit. "Well, it's what works for me." Not to say that all or even most Chaos magicians are behaving like this, but some are, and the option is there.
It's a bit like saying you're a writer because you talk about some ideas for stories etc. now and again, but have never actually put pen to paper. Both may be "writers", but they are two different interpritations of the word.
 
 
rising and revolving
23:56 / 01.04.04
In one sense, this seems like the gay marriage thing to me. Who cares if someone else calls themselves a "magician" while not putting in what you feel is the "proper and righteous degree of effort?"

Does that in some way diminish you? Does it make what you do less important? If it does, then maybe you need to 're-evaluate your stuff' as it were.

Really, it's a great big wonderful weird world, and everyone can learn something from everyone else. The whole 'sing affirmations while you do the dishes' is basically Bakti Yoga in essence, and I believe done right is as powerful a tool for change as anything else.

But I could be wrong! Either way though, it does me no harm.
 
 
Medicine God
00:12 / 02.04.04
[[[So what do you do then? What's your main area of focus? how is it "better"? (Meant to reply to your other thread on acceptance but have no time today).]]]

I don't do magick, my focus is more chi kung, but I say that with all the modesty I can muster- I'm extremely lazy. The problem I have is with the pool of arcane practices being diluted by fakers, albeit sincere ones. Chaos magick can be defined in a very grand way (manipulating the integral emptiness of existence without boundary), but it ends up being boiled down to whatever works for you and that translates to the ignorant as: Do what's easy and dismiss what's not.

[[[Why such bitter resentment Medicine God?]]]

Its part and parcel to being an ego functioning sinner. LORD, GRANT ME SALVATION!

[[[Um, first of all, I think this may be an April Fool's joke, the point of which being to piss people off. Anyhow, I hope so, because otherwise it seems very juvenile and bitter.]]]

Yeah, I generally come off like that, especially when I first start posting somewhere. Anger is a very visceral reaction and it grabs attention quickly when triggered, I usually endure the initial offended replies in hopes that a fairly dispassionate poster will come by and get the rest of the thread thinking.

[[[I mean, how the fuck can you even know what other people do in their own magical practices unless they tell you? And, y'know, really, I think most people are unlikely to tell somebody who seems this prone to being judgmental.]]]

Well, how the fuck do you think I know? They write about their unique expression of magick and I go "Hey, this is bullshit" and then I write about their unique expression of magick. I'll dig up some artcles at chaos matrix for examples later.

[[[I mean, what are you, dude, the R. Lee Ermey of mysticism? "Put down that sigil and drop your cock, FAGGOT!! I want to see some genuine motherfucking mystical shit happen in here, not some mamby-pamby momma's boy meditative horseshit! Let me ask you, how exactly do you intend to chant your mantra with your loverboy's cock in your mouth?!" Et cetera.]]]

That was pretty fucking funny.

[[[Anyway seeing as i'm here, i don't know what the big thing is about Chaos Magick and problems with it. You can't just pin the whole thing down and say 'there is a trend' because you have to admit that you don't know. Chaos Magick is one of the most free, spontaneous things you can work with. It's not about wanking, Cthulhu, Shoggoth's and sigils at it's essence, it's about freedom of choice and being creative. It's an artform in the sense that your free to create concepts/systems and ideas just to see if it works and if it doesn't you can dump it and try something else.]]]

At a conceptual level this isn't exactly as good a concept it sounds, when one achieves a certain Christ consciousness gnosis, then they're qualified to bring about revolution to their methods.

I'll get to the rest later
 
 
Perfect Tommy
00:39 / 02.04.04
I s'pose I can agree with some of your attitude—I did have to check myself for I AM R0X0R EFFORTLES M4GUS!!1! syndrome when things actually began to work.

But I think that a common trap is to think that if you're not totally hardcore, you shouldn't be bothering. To be perfectly honest, I see nothing at all wrong with someone using magick in very modest ways if that's all they want/need. By way of analogy, it would be great if everyone learned to play a musical instrument, but I don't think everyone needs to aspire to professional musicianhood and practice six hours a day.
 
 
eddie thirteen
01:02 / 02.04.04
[[[That was pretty fucking funny.]]]

Hey, at least *somebody* laughed. I dunno, maybe I'm on your side after all!

The main thing I don't get about this, though, is...I mean...for real, why would you care about someone else's practices? I've never once had anyone who was involved in the occult in any way attempt to foist their beliefs (or lack thereof) on me, which is the only reason I can see to vocally object to what someone else does. In any human endeavor, there are certainly poseurs, but there are (I believe) a lot more people who are looking around for something with half a clue of what they actually want.

Ego may drive them to claim they've got mad okult skillz they don't actually have -- just as (sorry) ego may drive you to hype your own superior wisdom (which, of course, we can only take your word for) -- but if you look past that (and you probably should, because most of those people are very young and are testing out all kinds of things, magical and otherwise, to see what works for them), you'll probably find someone who is genuinely seeking something out. What's the point in being rude to someone like that? If you yourself are truly a great magus or, y'know, whatever, you shouldn't have to lord it over others -- it should be clear to all that you are what you are without you saying a word about it. Or, if not what you are, that at least you're something other than someone who's trying to pick a fight. Which is kinda what you sound like, to me, and that does not say much for your own personal level of enlightenment, astonishing though it may be.

I think all you can really do, if you feel surrounded by people who you feel are missing it (note I say "you feel" and not "they are" -- they may very well be, but I don't think that's a judgment you or I are qualified to make), is attempt to show an example of what they could be by just being who you are. Tell people about what *you* do, if you think it's a better thing than whatever you think they're doing, and if it sounds like it'll work for them, they'll pick it up. And if not, then you're still doing it, and it still works for you, so...y'know, who gives a shit if no one else is doing it? I mean, unless you're actually looking for a following, in which case, God help you.
 
 
Frank Fress
01:32 / 02.04.04
Did he say he doesn't practice magick? Why complain about "a trend in Choas Magick in which the practitioner doesn't do any real excercises" if YOU don't practice on account of extreme laziness. Was this topic started as an excercise in self-loathing? I think I feel an ignore coming on...
 
 
Schism
01:32 / 02.04.04
Greets All:

Medicine, it seems that you feel that some grand ritual should be involved in many things. Jeet, is quick and effective, and that is its beauty. Chi Kung consists of a lot of exercises and they must be developed over time to be very precise, the result is a very strong body and mind.

Since you are involved in martial arts, you are used to a lot of ritual. Perhaps you feel that this is the only way to achive acceptable results in all things.

But any journey starts with the first step, and if some do what seems insignificant and achieve what they feel are the desired results, then so be it, they are learning and achieving. You seem to feel that Jeet works along those lines too. And it just may do that, not a lot of ritual just results.

Anyway thats my 2cents, thanks for listening, and hey this is a nice new look for Barbelith, kinda springish. heh
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
12:58 / 02.04.04
Chaos Magick is one of the most free, spontaneous things you can work with...at it's essence, it's about freedom of choice and being creative...I'm not trying to say that it's better than any other systems or that other sytems of Magick are safe, but there's no single path with signposts on it telling you what to do, you have to use your intuition, your forced to use your intuition, but that's what makes it so good.

I think the main problem that I have with "chaos magic" these days is that I think the term is a bit redundant now. All of the really interesting ideas that CM threw up have proliferated so widely through the occult world in general that it just seems a bit meaningless to think of yourself as a chaos magician in todays magical climate.

Also, I think it's a bit of a misnomer to think that there are these orthodox schools of magic that do everything by the book and have entire curriculums laid out for you to follow. I don't think magick actually works like that, and I don't think that these people/orders actually exist outside of our imaginations. Magic is a lot more messy than that, and I can't conceive of there actually being any really competant magicians whose personal system aren't full of creativity and spontaneity, and whose path and development isn't shaped and guided by their intuition. As far as I'm concerned, that's what magic is about and none of this stuff is or has ever been the exclusive preserve of CM. I reckon even the most hardcore of ceremonial magicians reach a stage in their game where it becomes instinctive, internalised, and in many ways not too far removed from the most free-est of freestyle shamanism.
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
14:22 / 02.04.04
By way of analogy, it would be great if everyone learned to play a musical instrument, but I don't think everyone needs to aspire to professional musicianhood and practice six hours a day.

Absolutely. But that doesn't mean an interesting discussion can't be had about the various issues surrounding the perceived 'dumbing down' of magical work that, arguably, seems to be a sideproduct of the widespread popularisation of magic that we've been seeing over the last five to ten years.

Not wanting to put words in the first poster's mouth, but I'd speculate that hir gripe might have something to do with the way in which certain practitioners of CM can sometimes be very vocal about their superior status over other approaches to magic. As if knowing about post-modernism and applying it to your work makes it supercede other flavours and approaches by dint of its post-modernity. Which is a bit daft, and I'm not sure how many people really think like that in real life, but it is a bit of a common meme. The eternally misspelled notion of "git ard magic" and the idea of "technical excellence", coupled with the various pitfalls common to constructing your own system as discussed above (sloppiness, laziness, etc creeping in) and the prevalence of thousands of 14 year old arm chair occultists going online and talking themsleves up as "bad ass chaotes" – peoples feathers are likely to get a bit ruffled.

In many ways I think chaos magic is almost becoming the new orthodoxy, in the online environment at any rate. "Too many unexamined ideas passed from book to book and from website to website" etc... as has already been mentioned elsewhere. I just think of myself as a magician these days, as in my opinion, genre categorisation is only useful in occultism if you're the proprietor of a bookshop.
 
 
---
16:40 / 02.04.04
All of the really interesting ideas that CM threw up have proliferated so widely through the occult world in general that it just seems a bit meaningless to think of yourself as a chaos magician in todays magical climate.

That's wierd you say that because i've been thinking about this for the last couple of days. I was thinking that if i am really 'Chaos', *laughs* then i wouldn't really be a Chaos Magician because the whole idea of it would be used just as randomly as i used anything else, so i'd equally be everything and nothing at the same time : Chaos Magician, Kabbalist, Shaman, Taoist, Buddhist, Celt, Gnostic etc, etc. The problem that arises with saying something like that though is the obvious, there's no way i can consider myself to be all of those things.

When it comes down to it i'm none of them and am just using whatever system allows me to use elements of all of those things together with as little problems as possible.

I don't know if i'm trying to explain something here or just confuse myself. I know perfectly what i mean in my head and can even picture it to some extent, i just have trouble trying to say it in words.

Also, I think it's a bit of a misnomer to think that there are these orthodox schools of magic that do everything by the book and have entire curriculums laid out for you to follow. I don't think magick actually works like that, and I don't think that these people/orders actually exist outside of our imaginations. Magic is a lot more messy than that, and I can't conceive of there actually being any really competant magicians whose personal system aren't full of creativity and spontaneity, and whose path and development isn't shaped and guided by their intuition. As far as I'm concerned, that's what magic is about and none of this stuff is or has ever been the exclusive preserve of CM. I reckon even the most hardcore of ceremonial magicians reach a stage in their game where it becomes instinctive, internalised, and in many ways not too far removed from the most free-est of freestyle shamanism.

I'm guessing that your right with this and that whatever i said was probably wrong and said without any proper knowledge of the situation. If this is true then it's good to know because i always thought that ceremonial magicians where the complete opposite of shamans. When you say 'reached a stage', that's probably where i was coming from, that it doesn't appear to be that way when you learn about it. Maybe if i went a bit deeper with other types of magic i'd see that this is the case.
 
 
Shanghai Quasar
19:56 / 02.04.04
I read it as: "Damn all those phoneys. They've totally ruined any satisfaction I might have taken out of listening to this band! I was totally grooving to this sound way before any of them. I have the posters and all the albums. I've been to, like, fifteen concerts. Yeah! You're all fucking poseurs."

Like, dude, whatever.
 
 
diz
21:30 / 02.04.04
Yeah, I generally come off like that, especially when I first start posting somewhere. Anger is a very visceral reaction and it grabs attention quickly when triggered, I usually endure the initial offended replies in hopes that a fairly dispassionate poster will come by and get the rest of the thread thinking.

so, in other words, you sit back and lazily toss off some sort of half-assed post onto the screen, expecting someone else to come along and put some real work into a post of some seriousness and rigor and depth?

i forget, what was this thread about again?
 
  
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