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Trying to get some results

  
 
fat_cap
10:44 / 08.07.05
Right -reading throught the "Why did you get into magic" thread, I thought it was about time I posted on this board.

I've been interested in all things "different" from an early age - Rading through "How to become psychic" books when I was a nipper (heheh) through all the obvious landmarks: The Invisibles, Fortean, Subgenius, readig about TOPY, Crowley, Anton Wilson etc. predisposition towards deja vu/ premonitions when I was younger etc.

When I was about 21 I met my older brother who had been adpoted out of the family - unbeknowst to me and found out that he was into the same sort of stuff - only much deeper.

From then on, I've flirted on the boundaries of "magic". I've read Crowley stuff but find it a bit too "dense" to really get into, tried Lucid dreaming which had really good results once but never again after that (lusting for results too much?), have tried forms of sigil magic to...well - not much results really! Taking a combination of Acid and Ecstasy one night really blew the doors wide open and showed me that there really was more to life than "normality" - or maybe I was just really frazzled.

I also found out that I had been using graffiti as a sigilisation process without really knowing it. I had always "imbued" certain ideas or changes I wanted to make, or things I wanted to happen into each new tag, or piece or dub I designed - and thought that by putting them up, and getting other people to see them, and react to there prescence would empower whatever "wish" I had tied in with it... alot like I later found out sigils do. However, to be honest, I never saw much returns for this practice except a few convictions with our beloved police force.

I have recently got into meditation after spending a while relatively "straight". I am a graphic artist and had needed to spent ALOT of my free time at home working on my prtfolio to push me into a better job, so didn't really have time for anything magic-like.

I had been doing what I thought you would do while meditating (concentrating on nothing and letting your mind become calm and blank), but found this very hard. After reading a few online texts and a great book I picked up, I tried a zen Busshist approach which involves counting your breath and concentrating on various stages of the breath to get into a meditative state. The second time I tried this new technique i got some really cool results - a sense of euporia, tingling in my body and a great sense of connection with everything. However - after this inital breakthrough, I find that I can't get back to the same point, primarily through my mind getting stuck up on the notion of wanting these results, while meditating, rather than actually clearing itself of all thoughts.

I would like to take a closer look at a more seroius magical practice/ excercise, as I would like my life to take a different path in the very near future - and my own blend of sigilisation/ meditation excercises havn't really brought any results about this yet.

I know that this has turned a bit (!) long winded, but I was wondering if anyone could help me with where to turn next? Things to try which could show me some results. Im beginning to think that - despite Grant Morrison's requests to "...just do it. Try magic for yourself", I'm either not really cut out for it or it doesn't work all that well.

Oh yeah - I'm more interested in modern day/ psychological/ chaos type magical stuff rather than Voodoo or Norse magic or something which I dont feel I have as much connection with.

Sorry to sound so n00bish as I know there are alot of very experienced "magicians" around here.
 
 
Joetheneophyte
10:49 / 08.07.05
Lust for results definately comes into play

Haven't had major successes with magick myself but the funny little quirky magick I have attempted, the little 'provers' have come to fruitition

Why these have worked and the others haven't I can only put down to Lust for Results affecting the outcome

That or the Universe/God/ whatever doesn't think my requested changes are good for me or life in general

Keep at it and go for little un-emotive requests and workings but peculiar enough to be noticable

good luck
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
11:08 / 08.07.05
Oh yeah - I'm more interested in modern day/ psychological/ chaos type magical stuff rather than Voodoo or Norse magic or something which I dont feel I have as much connection with.

There is no such thing as "modern day magic", just magic the same as it always been.

The psychological model has its uses when you're getting into this stuff, but I find it ultimately limiting the further you go.

Chaos magic feels more and more like an absurd title to append to magical practice, since all of the most important aspects of it have proliferated so widely into the "mainstream" of contemporary magical thought that the term "Chaos" seems increasingly meaningless and silly.

There's just magic, and that runs through everything from Vodou to the Northern trad to whatever it is that floats your boat and clicks with you personally. Or else it doesn't. There's a John Coltrane quote that says: "There are only two types of music, good music and bad music". Same goes for magic.
 
 
fat_cap
11:54 / 08.07.05
Well yeah - I didn't want to get too hung up on tag-names and such, I was just trying to point out what I feel drawn to and more comfortable with. I feel that working with something with personal significance and meaning to myself would, ultimately, be better.

Also, that I already have an interest in certain areas of things and feel that being more interested in a certain area, would be much more likely to get me researching and acting out ideas rather than something that isn't in my train of though...at the minute Magic should be personal shouldn't it? Or should I just grab and try whatever may suit the occasion?

I totally get what your saying though.. as I said in my first post - forgive me for sounding N00bish!
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
12:02 / 08.07.05
Yeah, just my kneejerk response to the words "modern day", "chaos" and "psychological" appearing together in a sentence.

I think you're spot on with looking at what resonates personally. I find that magic often feels like an ongoing process of excavating what it is that moves you and resonates with you the most. Uncovering it stage by stage, getting a better understanding of it, making nervous experiments and learning from what happens, making mistakes and knowing not to repeat them, accomplishing successes and learning how to build on them, gradually shaping your magical life on a day-to-day basis.

Why do you want to practice magic?
 
 
power vacuums & pure moments
12:14 / 08.07.05
However - after this inital breakthrough, I find that I can't get back to the same point, primarily through my mind getting stuck up on the notion of wanting these results, while meditating, rather than actually clearing itself of all thoughts.

Recognising that is half of the work done, now just try and relax. Giving too much intellectual attention to phenomena experienced in meditation is a common error. In a month more of practice, definately in a year more those phenomena will seem like nothing at all. It just gets deeper and deeper...

In my opinion learning to silence the internal dialogue is the most important and universal skill of the magician/shaman/whatever. Looking back at my journals there is a near perfect correlation between improvement in meditative ability and success in more active forms of magik.
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
12:21 / 08.07.05
Was thinking along those lines the other day actually, I was berating myself with my protestant work ethic stick about how I don't ever do any meditation, ever, and trying to come up with some strategy for how to build this into my practice. When it occurred to me that all that sitting still for hours at a time before my altars to the Gods, contemplating their mysteries and seeking psychic communion with them, could well be considered "meditation". It doesn't happen in the context of the Eastern mysteries, and I don't self-consciously think of it as meditation, but similar internal processes are probably at work.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
12:25 / 08.07.05
I'm more interested in modern day/ psychological/ chaos type magical stuff rather than Voodoo or Norse magic --fat_cap

I think I understand perfectly what you're saying here, fat_cap. When you're starting from scratch (or maybe coming back to magic after a long break) a more abstracted model, created/described mostly using language that avoids traditional magical terms, can be more helpful initially. It was the psychological model that invited me back into magic after a year's shutdown, allowing me to step out of the rigourous scepticism I'd adopted as a defence.

But GL is essentially correct when he says that:

The psychological model has its uses when you're getting into this stuff, but I find it ultimately limiting the further you go.

After working within the psychological model for some time, I began to find it rather sterile. It neither properly explained why some of my workings that failed, nor some of the results I was getting, and it did not properly explain results that other people whose veracity I trusted were claiming. And after a certain point it didn't seem to offer any way to really develop or progress--just more of the same. It's great as a sort of starter-kit, but as you get deeper it raises more questions than it answers.

Tips for getting started (and please bear in mind when you read this that I'm effectively a n00b as well--I've been mucking about with all this for years but in such an unconscionably half-arsed way that I might as well have just started):

First, my reflexive nag re: learning some form of divination. You really should, if you haven't already. I like the Tarot myself. The runes are amazing of course and can be used for magic as well as divination, but if you're going to do any serious work with them you're going to have to deal with the associated pantheon at some point so you might wish to look elsewhere for the time being.

Maybe you could go back and look at the themes and ideas that interested you in magic originally. Were there particular authors you liked as a child who incorporated magical themes into their works? Perhaps you could look at their influences and see if these relate back to the myths and legends of a particular culture. That might provide you with an access point.

You also talk about magical artwork and graffitti. This could offer a great avenue for exploration--look at the way that various cultures have used their art in a magical or spiritual context, see if anything resonates with you.

Good luck!
 
 
power vacuums & pure moments
12:50 / 08.07.05
sitting still for hours at a time before my altars to the Gods, contemplating their mysteries and seeking psychic communion with them, could well be considered "meditation". It doesn't happen in the context of the Eastern mysteries...

I disagree, from an eastern perspective thats pure bhakta yoga. Very righteous karmically and most definately a path to liberation in itself if persued with sincerity. Different people, different paths and all that.
 
 
Gypsy Lantern
13:44 / 08.07.05
I disagree, from an eastern perspective thats pure bhakta yoga

I guess. At the risk of derailing this thread, I'm grappling with the issue of whether or not I should make meditation a part of my magical life. I really hate doing it. I've kept up the daily meditation for about 3 months max, on a few seperate occasions, and while it's been vaguely valuable-ish I'm not sure it's really for me at this time in my life. But maybe it is, for those same reasons. Or maybe I should just accept the fact that me and meditation don't really get on, much like lucid dreaming and astral projection.
 
 
Papess
14:03 / 08.07.05
There is no such thing as "modern day magic", just magic the same as it always been.

Much like I have always wonder what "New Age" is suppose to mean. Since, most of the wisdom that New Age draws upon (and then dilutes), is based upon Ancient Wisdom.
 
 
Papess
14:11 / 08.07.05
When it occurred to me that all that sitting still for hours at a time before my altars to the Gods, contemplating their mysteries and seeking psychic communion with them, could well be considered "meditation". It doesn't happen in the context of the Eastern mysteries, and I don't self-consciously think of it as meditation, but similar internal processes are probably at work.

Lovely that you understand this, Gypsy Lantern. In Eastern traditions this is generally called "contemplation", rather than meditation. Good choice of wording.
 
 
Unconditional Love
17:42 / 08.07.05
try moving routines of chi gung if sitting meditation is difficult, or practice an external martial art internally, ie practice it slowly, relaxed and fix the awareness in each pose and movement feeling each difference.
 
 
--
05:12 / 09.07.05
My advice is to just read everything that seems interesting to you, try it out, keep lots of notes, what you end up liking pursue to the limits and what you dislike discard from your practice. Establishing a system can be a very useful organizational tool. I can't overemphasize how important the reading and taking notes bit can be. I've reviewed a lot of my old magical notes recently and I've been surprised by how much of it I disagree with now.
 
 
eye landed
05:31 / 09.07.05
is it meditation if you 'contemplate' without contemplating any object? or is that transcendental meditation?

fat_cap, if you like the modern psychological model, you might want to look into a popular school of magic called 'science', which has some really nifty tricks in its repertoire. im convinced that the immediate frontiers of science lie in the disciplines of magic, including meditation, energy, dream psychology and cosmic communication, visualization and body control, and even the sympathetic vibrations of the universe. excuse me. sorry.
 
  
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