Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Temple >

Winds of change

Unconditional Love

11:09 / 19.12.06

Recently i was reminded of the notion that a magician changes and adapts to the prevailing winds or circumstance, the conditions that you are surrounded by. I thought this through and thought about the contrast of trying to self change to create change around yourself.

I think i am better at the former rather than the later, i try to estimate how things are changing and apply insight into how i should adapt to what i percieve to be around me, i find this alot easier than starting from the point of changing myself, often this process of adapting to circumstance and conditions does change me, but by focusing on what is other to me i find i change more easily.

I am not sure why that is, but it could be that trying to self construct is in someway a limitation at least to my perception, its about creating a point of separation, in a sense getting a distance by becoming self absorbed.

I find this approach most difficult, but i think i know others who dont, they seem to be able to self reinforce much more easily, but imo seem to change less as if they are a constant, letting nothing fully in to change them, perhaps i am wrong about that but thats how it seems.

I wonder what other people perceptions of themselves are in relation to change, how much of social and environmental variables do people let in, and how much is the notion of self control comparable to that opening, how rigid are we in how we self define and how does that effect magical practice, do faith and dogma for example act as tunnel vision to possibility or do they act as reinforcement for the capability to practice magic?

Does self get in the way of magical acts of is self the primary focus of all magic. wondering.

12:21 / 19.12.06

What does any of this actually mean? In relation to other people, or the variety of roles or interactions you might find yourself in in the real world? Can you give me a specific, real-world, sensory specific example - prefereably several - of what you're talking about? 'Cos as far as I can tell, it's just some vauge thoughts about identity that happen to be whistling round in your head. "Mindwank" as you said to me once.

In short, give me a real world example of what you're talking about.

13:20 / 19.12.06

Does self get in the way of magical acts of is self the primary focus of all magic.

Is "self" one thing? I'm thinking there are different kinds of Self, some of which are the focus of magic, some of which are the source, and some of which get in the way. More specifically, I think it's what you might call the "Greater Self" that is the source of magic, and it's the "Lesser Self" that tends to get in the way.

But the source of the magic, the will, whatever, isn't quite the same as the focus. Even so, if you are focusing the magic and will of the Greater Self on the Lesser Self, the Lesser Self can still get in the way. The tendancy to avoid change is evident in Psychotherapy - all those defense and coping mechanisms that are so hard to overcome, not just because they are ingrained, but because they are evolved to actively resist directed change, such that all input directed at changing them is interpreted as a reinforcer.

I think it is easier for me to pull bits of the world towards me, and to coast as a whole on greater tides than it is for me to change the pieces within me. This is not to say that I don't, or don't think I should change - on the contrary! But it's harder.

--Ember--

16:54 / 19.12.06

...about the contrast of trying to self change to create change around yourself.

So, self-change-through-magick versus changing-one's-environment-through-magick, in order to arrive at the same result - Which is preferable and why?

Is that the question(s)?

Unconditional Love

20:01 / 19.12.06

More a question of self change with self focus or self change with environmental/other focus.

A concrete example would be trying to self improve through say self confidence tapes and books as compared to a group therapy setting where a variety of influences are creating alot of iterated interactions and reactions to a shared circumstance.

Another example might be group based magical work as compared to solo, where the self has more access to other influence, greater perspective, a greater sense of self being generated through wider contact, shared basis for ideas, what some people term group consciousness.

I get the feeling some people i know would rather wear rigid attitudes for the point of self perpetuation, rather than open to difference, diversity of experience around a shared theme for example.

I am kind of musing on group therapy and playing in a band, different environments and groups with it seems very different protocols for self identity within a group, the band structure is in a sense trying to create a consistant identity for itself, in some respects rigid, where as the group therapy is open to change in a more all round way, people come and go and share similar themes but dont try to place import on the identity they are sharing, instead relating in order to change to gather feed back, prehaps the group therapy structure has less denoted rules.

Basically trying to understand how the things i engage with change me and others and why lone self improvement doesnt seem to work well for me at all and why it may work alot better for other people, is it something i can learn?

Unconditional Love

23:01 / 19.12.06

A more theoretical approach might be to look at it form the view point of yesod, subconscious foundation, habit or pattern mind, that the reformulation and creation of patterns within group consciousness will be easier because in essence a pattern is already being learnt that exsists within collective subconscious structure, so a group facillitates a better learning environment because greater sympathy can be gained from the patterns being sought after, the need becomes greater because the desire to learn is multiplied.

Where as perhaps it is harder to change patterns from a solo position, because of the prexsisting patterns have more of a voice and less weight or force to change, in someway it could be compared to commiting self against self, if you follow.

I am trying to understand the dynamics of group consciousness, how collective workings operate outside of a social politics agenda, if there are any base laws so to speak, in how groups create change in a person and people.

For example i get a sense of belonging to a field of consciousness when in certain groups, that have a differing flavour to other groups, usually not coloured by one dominant personality but the whole group. It could of course be a projection, but i dont think i am the only one that has this perception.

Unconditional Love

23:07 / 19.12.06

I am also reminded of morphogenic fields etc

Morphogrnic fields

It was along time ago i read Rupert Sheldrke though.

12:36 / 09.01.07

I don't have a lot of experience of magic and I'm more into mysticism, so I might be a bit partial, but it seems to me your idea of "too much obsession with the self "getting in the way of real change is right on the money.

While rituals such as banishing and the like might have value, I think the only real change in people happens when people don't act in accordance to some pre-concieved idea of what they're supposed to be. When you don't fall back on existing self-structures, new ones can be created automatically, and they're hopefully less tied up in neurosis than the old ones...

On the other hand, one has to acknowledge the shadow elements of one's psyche and not simpy repress them. Perhaps this is where magic can be really useful?

13:46 / 10.01.07

I'm an amateur Taoist, so from my perspective, it's not a question of changing oneself to match the environment or vice versa, but moving in tune with the environment to get where you want to go.

In other words:

Don't resist the torrent, or surrender to it. Surf it.

17:24 / 10.01.07

I suppose the question I would pose is: What is the difference?

I'm unsure that it is possible to even have a self with out it being in relation to other, even if it is in the context of an "other" within oneself. In the case of an other within oneself, it is still, after all, an "other", thus a condition external to ones point of reference.

Even in cases of magick that is designed to change some sort of undesired trait, when I look at it, it always has something to do with relationship, either my relationship with some facet of the world around me, or my relationship with my percieved self, which is still located as an object of awareness. So looking at this, my view would be to do both, for when taken to the heart of it, they are not really both, but both one and the same.