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"Stupid" magick, religion and spirituality questions

  
  

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Papess
13:37 / 03.08.07
In many pantheons, bith Eastern and Western, the gods can incarnate into human form at will. Or be able to have a human form as well as a god form, as well as a elemental form and animal form. Athena comes to mind and so does Kwan Yin. They can choose to appear to us as they wish. I don't understand how this is percieved as "restricted embodiment".
 
 
Papess
13:42 / 03.08.07
X-post with Live.

I don't believe that possession is the only way for the gods to create an embodiment of human proportions. I am certain that there are accounts of deities who incarnate at will without having to use a host.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
13:44 / 03.08.07
Med., it wasn't supposed to be taken entirely seriously.
 
 
Papess
13:46 / 03.08.07
I think I will start a that thread about the Nature of the Gods a little later. I have limited time ATM, but I hope to discuss this more indepth in a dedicated thread.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
13:47 / 03.08.07
Well, yeah, sure. I've read references to the Lwa showing up in the flesh, and there's various bits in the sagas where a God--frequently Odin--turns up in person, but jumping into a handy votary's body still seems preferred over corporeal manifestations.
 
 
Papess
13:49 / 03.08.07
Med., it wasn't supposed to be taken entirely seriously.

Heh, well, I guess that may be my concern. Seeing how it is becoming quite popular as a catch-phrase, it can create a whole lot of misunderstanding and make a lot of assumptions about god-nature, without proper examination.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
14:00 / 03.08.07
I don't think it's ever likely to become that popular. "Famous for 15 people" and all that, eh?
 
 
Ticker
16:19 / 03.08.07
I think I will start a that thread about the Nature of the Gods a little later.

there's a really good one already kicking I'll see if I can remember enough details to dig it out.
 
 
Ticker
16:22 / 03.08.07
I was thinking of this thread which I personally find valuable but it may not be what Medulla was thinking of...

From tiny thought forms massive gods do grow ... maybe
 
 
Ticker
16:25 / 03.08.07
triple post threat is me. sorry.

speaking as someone who has been present at your performance art/ritual ceremonies, i have to say it filled a gap for me that i was not even aware of, and was quite powerful. i highly encourage you to do more.

aw shucks epona! Glad you enjoyed it/them. I think I've grown enough hide back from the last one to do another. I was hoping some specific tools would have appeared by now but I suppose I have to go chase them down to get the next one set up. I have 3 more I'm supposed to do this year. I really should just pick a date...
 
 
Ticker
16:43 / 03.08.07
hahah one more because the last two pages have just so much great shite on them.

I really twitch in my seat every time I read people talking about finding/identifying their patron--especially in those cases where the quest is holding up the rest of their practice. Everyone is full of spirit, everyone is connected to their ancestors, the city or the land where they live, to teh places and people around them.

Having a particular God or Goddess you feel close to is something that should evolve naturally out of your practice over time. No-one needs a patron or matron deity. Certainly no-one should feel they have to worry about it or go looking. If Ze's out there, Ze'll turn up and make Hirself known in good time.

(I also see lots of people giving themselves all kinds of airs and graces just because they happen to have drawn the gaze of some Person of Restricted Embodiment or other. I reckon that half the time, people who end up with a patron or matron deity are muttonheads who need poking


there's another piece of this which is investing a chuck of your self id kit around Who you worship. You publicly announce your relationships and then create a cosmology around them. Being to rigid with this leads to the really really uncomfortable moment of realizing you were wrong. What you do then depends on how much ego is invested in what you thought versus what you currently think (which may not be the final destination either). Many people do not give themselves the ability to grow and change spiritually as much as they really ought considering how rich and varied our resources are today. What ends up happening is something we've discussed in the Otherkin thread. You get some people (not everybody) unable to admit they have changed or their perceptions have changed and they pile layers on without the courage to start fresh.

with some Deities we start with the most accessible external manifestation and then as our understanding increases we ether graduate to a deeper more obscure level or can get handed off altogether. Getting traded can be a bit of a shock only slightly less problematic than realizing you were just wrong or misdirected in the first place.

Not everyone you date is the 'One', not every Deity of your study and devotion is either.

Not to mention all the really powerful spiritworkers I personally know who have a Matron/Patron Who will not reveal Their name. It's suspected they are doing this because of the assumptions that go along with the Name.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
17:21 / 03.08.07
What ends up happening is something we've discussed in the Otherkin thread. You get some people (not everybody) unable to admit they have changed or their perceptions have changed and they pile layers on without the courage to start fresh.

Ooooh yes, multiple patron disorder, whereby the unfortunate sufferer ends up with five or six different "Patron" deities, often from upwards of four pantheons. The polytheistic equivalent of being a blue and gold half-dragon unicorn werewolf with angel wings and three fox tails. In a nappy.
 
 
Ticker
17:30 / 03.08.07
yeah I'm really fucking glad I managed to have enough of a sense of humor to not end up making extra giant headdresses to go along with my new puffed up delusional reality.

Truth is it is really hard to have the impact of study and work bring you to a place where in order to progress you have to let go of older beliefs, whatever they are. There's a lot of self invested in what you think is going on and it's very important to build in ego cushions for when you get booted out of that high flying contraption you spent so much time building.

I think there is some extra sense built into not talking to people about Who your Main Peeps are because it can change or evolve and it doesn't automatically need to be a public spectacle. For me the rules of silence are looking a lot more functional these days because shit is changing in such epic ways I can't say squat about the process and have it hold up as True ten minutes later.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
18:01 / 03.08.07
I think there is some extra sense built into not talking to people about Who your Main Peeps are because it can change or evolve and it doesn't automatically need to be a public spectacle.

Well, not automatically, no. But people recieving direct contect and suddenly finding themselves on the recieving end of a strong pull towards a particular being or pantheon might have little choice between going public or floundering around in the dark and perhaps going under--at least at first.
 
 
Unconditional Love
18:12 / 03.08.07
There is a sense in which altar work and visualisation is embodiment, if they are worked with as a mirror of the self and deitie is perceived as well as being self as other as well, i think that is the goal of a majority of systems through various methods to break down the difference between self and other, its that moment which is described as transcendence or union. It seems thou the methods and goals of moving closer to deities may differ, embodiment can be an act that hits any area of human experience.

To witness or perceive a god as separate is still to merge the perception with the object of devotion, thou possession may seem more immediate because it directly deals with bodily intelligence, the results are not too dissimilar.

Practices that deal with spirit as other than self seek to find it outside in an act of recognition/perception, those that embody seek to feel,move and dance in deity (the community also percieves). The experiences differ but the union/interaction is of the import in religious ecstasy.

So for example in tantra which uses both approaches simultaneously especially with regards to nyasa and visualisation a practitioner is both embodying deity through touch visualising and performing altar work, this i think is an attempt to maximize religious experience by working with perceptions of self and other in the same moment, a focus for removing boundary's between self and environment.
 
 
Ticker
18:35 / 03.08.07
Well, not automatically, no. But people recieving direct contect and suddenly finding themselves on the recieving end of a strong pull towards a particular being or pantheon might have little choice between going public or floundering around in the dark and perhaps going under--atr least at first.

agreed, but IME those folks our far out numbered by the self appointed grand poobas who announce the Allies in order to shore up their credentials.

Though I really really wish there was a healthy way to address the delusion/false stuff floating around many people working without the benefit of a trad or more experienced members of the same faith. I mean sure it could be a group delusion but at least some sort of head check is in order. This self constructing reality is a tricky business and more often than not people are paintng themselves into a miserable paranoid-ego screaming corner.

but as GL pointed out earlier even skilled pratitioners with experience in the trad can get shit wrong about other people's paths. So I dunno you do what you can.

a focus for removing boundary's between self and environment.

That's a very interesting insight though I wonder how many people particpating in possession view it that way?
 
 
EmberLeo
21:53 / 03.08.07
Ooooh yes, multiple patron disorder, whereby the unfortunate sufferer ends up with five or six different "Patron" deities, often from upwards of four pantheons. The polytheistic equivalent of being a blue and gold half-dragon unicorn werewolf with angel wings and three fox tails. In a nappy.

Mrf. That kind of comment really annoys me, because while I can see where you're going with it, and I pretty much agree with it, it technically applies to me.

I have multiple patrons, in multiple pantheons. The only reason I even try figuring out which one might be my "primary" patron is that all the humans I work with seem to think I should have a "True Head" (What's wrong with just being me, I ask?).

I also have my own - unintentional - menagerie of associated spirts - mostly animals, and thankfully most of them only show up every once in a while, but a plant, a fellow I'm pretty sure is fey, and two of my immediate ancestors.

By description I must sound fluffy as all fuck. I never intended to collect all these friends - when I first started out, I honestly thought I'd never have any spirit allies or patron deities - but whenever I consider the possibility of treating it as a linear path, whoever I thought I was putting down for a while tells me to embrace the power of "AND".

So here I am constantly flipping back and forth between four major relationships, a dozen or so secondary relationships, and a half dozen spirit companions, wondering how they could possibly all want my attention, and that I should find a way to refine my focus. Yet, whenever I think "I must be doing something wrong", I get back "Yes, your view is too narrow. You're supposed to be working for hundreds of us, but you keep trying to keep it down to a handful. Quit it."

AAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGHHHHHH.

[/rant]

--Ember-the-vanic-bunny-stag-lion-dryad-of-death--
 
 
Unconditional Love
09:49 / 04.08.07
In a mixed race, multicultural, multifaith society which merges and explores ideas through trade and art this seems like an inevitability. As community expands to be inclusive of as many spirits as possible, so more and more spiritual ideas will become mixed.

While it will be anathema to traditional purists and reviled, to the majority of self aware (on a good day) mutts like myself i cannot see it being too much of a problem.

The days of one culture, one race, one god, one nation, one faith, one vision, one sex are slowly but surely breaking down into an inclusive diversity of merged expression.

The break down or realignment is including all sorts of reactions especially the more common one of a return to the past when things were easier, when this was this and that was that.

I guess what i am saying is its all mixed up. (and then remixed) ad infinitum.....
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
10:44 / 04.08.07
Ember: Well, I'm being snarky, obvs. There's a difference between "patron" as in "God/Goddess I have been working closely with over a period of time and with whom I have a real relationship" and "God/Goddess I got when I took an online quiz and thought looked cool."

Wolfangel: What does any of "The days of one culture, one race, one god, one nation, one faith, one vision, one sex are slowly but surely breaking down into an inclusive diversity of merged expression actually mean in this context? What does that have to do with the concept of having a Lwa Met Tet or whatever your trad calls yer main Guy?
 
 
Mako is a hungry fish
11:03 / 04.08.07
Stupid magic question... or magick in this context, because it deals with Aliestar Crowley.

I was told today that Mr Crowley had one of the most impressive heroin habits of all time, about 11grams per day in all its glory (some time between the age of 45 and 65) and I'm curious if: -

a) this is true.

and if so

b) how did this influence his work, compared to his non dirty-smackie period?
 
 
Unconditional Love
12:40 / 04.08.07
This has everything to do with the idea of mono perception, that a thing or spirit must be singular, that there is one traditions view point which is right and another which is wrong, dualistic thinking that limits to two options of perception usually focusing on one without processing the other. (or others)

Its too illustrate the difference when importance is not placed on one concept as being the be all and end all.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
15:10 / 04.08.07
But that's not what's happening here. Talking about having a particular guide, a master of your head, a special friend or whatever doesn't make one a monotheist. It just means that someone happens to have a more focused or intense relationship with that Dude than with Their esteemed collegues. Don't get where the mono perception comes in, until you decided to bring it.
 
 
EmberLeo
03:46 / 05.08.07
The technical term for belief that mutiple deities exist, but that any given individual or group must worship only one of them is "Henothism".

Tribal Judaism was henotheistic, for example. Sure, the tribe over there has their own gods, but we're only supposed to worship this one.

Mordant: I knew you were being snarky. As I said - I totally understand, and even agree with what you were getting at. I... er... well, I tried to make my outburst somewhat humorous.

--Ember--
 
 
Ticker
15:27 / 06.08.07
"We are not realists. We are not idealists. We are intermediatists — that nothing is real, but that nothing is unreal: that all phenomena are approximations one way or the other between realness and unrealness." --Charles Fort, Lo!

Happy Birthday to Mr. Fort!

I'm wondering if there is something fundementally Buddhist about Fortean perspectives?
 
 
Ticker
15:00 / 08.08.07
Anyone know/practice Deity Yoga?

I'm curious if it is always done with the Buddha or with other Deities.
 
 
Papess
15:33 / 08.08.07
I practice deity yoga.

I have tried to use this method with all sorts of other deities from different pantheons. Goddesses, specifically. Some of them didn't really work with this method for me. However, I have had some success with some Goddesses, though. It has been a learning process.

Buddhas, (especially Tara, whom I work with constantly), and they are very accustomed to it, I suppose. Also, there is a very extensive and well explained methods of doing so for each deity in the Buddhist and Hindu pantheons. Granted, one is supposed to have empowerments to do this sort of thing. So, my work with Goddesses from other systems may have been a bit naive, ice-breaking work. SOmetimes, butt-breaking...but that is another story!
 
 
trouser the trouserian
15:35 / 08.08.07
Me too. I've mostly done deity yoga with Kali, Lalitatripurasundari, and Ganapati.
 
 
Ticker
13:46 / 15.08.07
I've been reading about the empowerments around Deity yoga. seems many of the more informative sites online require lineage checking to access some of the documentation out there.

so a few questions:

1. How does one fine a reputable lineage/guru to gain empowerment and study with?
2. Is it actually a needful thing for working with the Deity/yidam?
3. Has anyone read Guide to Dakini Land by Kelsang Gyatso?

I think I have some long standing authority issues and mistrust around spiritual teachers and tend to prefer to go to the Source directly *but* I recognize that some teachers are highly skilled insightful people.

While looking into transmission and empowerments I was struck by the similarity to Reiki processes. I may be misunderstanding but the idea of introducing someone to the correct 'flavor' by personal contact is rather fascinating. Thinking about it I'm now wondering if non lineage, non human to human transmission of learning and intro to Deity is a modern rule but an ancient exception.
 
 
Papess
14:00 / 15.08.07
Guide to Dakini Land by Kelsang Gyatso?

Oh my. I just picked that up!

There are some issues around Kelsang Gyatso, but I don't think that should stop anyone from learning from his work. I really don't feel good about the whole controversy, but you may wish to inform yourself and make your own decisions, Inkwitch.

Maybe we could start a thread on Deity yoga. you are bringning up some very interesting questions. Some of which I have asked myself. I am blessed with an excellent Root Guru, although I have been very distrustful of the whole human-to-human guide-thing, in the past. It can be hard to find a suitable Spiritual Guide, but people sometimes tend to trust those that are not in human form before those that are. For others, it is the opposite.

Not sure if that helps at all. There is a lot more to discuss, if you want to.
 
 
EmberLeo
20:04 / 15.08.07
I've seen a lot of Deity Yoga references (though mostly in this thread, I guess). I don't have anything to add myself, but it seems like there's more than enough material to make a thread on the topic worthwhile for you guys, eh?

--Ember--
 
 
EmberLeo
20:11 / 15.08.07
Okay, color me stupid.

For the most part, I think I understand what you are all referring to when you start discussing "Sigil Magic", but I have the nagging feeling that I'm missing something.

I understand the use of symbols in magic, making talismans and the like. I understand the creation and use of bindrunes. Can somebody who understands both bindrunes AND sigil magic, as an actual practicioner, please explain to me if I have the right idea, and what's different between them (aside from the fact that Bindrunes have a specific cultural context)?

--Ember--
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
20:28 / 15.08.07
Sigil magic is that branch of magic which deals with abstracting one's intent into a visual symbol. A bindrune would be a species of sigil.

As the term is generally applied in these parts: "sigil magic" uses the Roman alphabet, in much the same way as one would make a bindrune. The sigil thus created is abstracted into a random doodle, often losing all resemblance to written characters; it is then "charged" by the magician entering "gnosis," which here means ecstasis, more or less. Meditation, masturbation, or bungee-jumping are engaged in whilst fixing one's eyes on the sigil, which is then destroyed and forgotten. One might alternatively charge the sigil by repeated drawing.

As you can see, this is a wonderfully simple technique which, were one to use it exclusively, would become about as inspiring and interesting as a wet weekend in Basingstoke. As part of a magical toolkit it's invaluable; by itself, meh. Boring.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
20:31 / 15.08.07
...I guess the main differences between a sigil and a bindrune would be 1) the cultural and traditional context, and 2) the potential for the whole thing to blow up in your face if you do it wrong. That, and sigils generally don't potentially come with a 12-pack of Aesir and no health warning.
 
 
EvskiG
20:41 / 15.08.07
On the rare occasions I create a sigil I don't use Roman characters.

I translate the key word or words of intent into Hebrew and then work out a sigil using the Golden Dawn's Rose Cross Lamen.

Like so. (Although I translate rather than transliterate.)
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
20:58 / 15.08.07
Thanks Ev G. It's good to bring up other methods of sigil creation; I have a regrettable tendency to gravitate towards the Invisible Ink method when I think of sigil magic, to the exlusion of other techniques.
 
  

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