Dark Magick Part 1: An Introduction

I've written about darkness before, in Reflections on Darkness and Dark Magic-The Origins of Light, but I've never truly written about the techniques and ideas used to access the powers hidden away behind the veil of cultural acceptance.  I enjoyed writing my last series and the depth that I could go into on each subject, so I've decided to do the same with another important concept in all magician's repertoires.  Dark magick is important in all of our educations because whether we want to embrace it or not, it is out there and we need to understand the basics.

I've always tended to walk a more left-handed path, but acknowledge that it's not for everyone.  In my last posts I wrote about defensive magick which I could never have understood completely without having to use it while dealing with the darker aspects of magick.  Every creator of magickal theory from Gerald Gardner to Aleister Crowley to Cornelius Agrippa has at least shortly dabbled in the darkness, and most have done a lot more than dabble.

Let's get down to it then.  My definition of dark magick is simply anything that is considered taboo within the general magickal culture.  This could range from sacrifices to evocations to ritualized sex.  Many people touch upon the majority of these topics at least in part during their practices, but most do not fully embrace them.  The typical practice is fine for most, but there are those out there that feel the pull to do more than simply brush up against it and I'd like to explain my views and experiences so that those who tend to follow a more left-handed path can learn a few things from my hard won wisdom and maybe give me a few tidbits of their own.

Defensive Magick: Emergency Protection

My previous posts on defensive magick allow you time to think about them for a while.  They give you insights for you to play around with.  Daily defensive magick generally is something that you can tweak each day until you feel like you've got it just right, and protection for your spellwork is something that definitely depends on the type of ritual you're doing and your preferences.  These are all things that you can research and tweak as you go. Emergency defensive magick is definitely not something you want to plan to tweak on the fly.  It's something that you want to research as much as possible and prepare in advance in case you need it.

My typical emergency deals with spirits or entities of some sort, and I'm really having a lot of trouble coming up with anything else, so I'll focus on the entity issues and some basic ways to get rid of whatever is troubling you.

The first thing that you must do is to try to figure out anything you can about the entity.

• How has the temperature changed?  If it's warmer, the entity is probably more of fire based entity while if it's gotten colder, it's probably more air or water.  
• Is there a certain smell?  The entity is probably in some part related to that smell or at least what that smell means to you.  
• How do you feel?  Is it dread that you're feeling because of what's happening or is it something entirely based on your feeling about the entity.  
• Do you have a strange yearning for something?  Most of us were either born with or have trained our intuition to some degree.  It's important to listen to what it's telling us, and most of the time this is our best guess at what we should do.  At one time, we had something coming into our home through our closet.  For some reason my wife had an almost compulsive desire for the smell of lilac.  We looked everywhere and when we finally found some lilac water the next day it became our best tool in dealing with the entity which had plagued us for several days.
• Most importantly, why is the spirit there?  Did you call a spirit without proper protective measures in place?  Did you piss something off?  Do you already know what or who the spirit is?

All of these should play a part in how you deal with it.  There are of course things you should do in nearly every situation though.

1. First and foremost, stop being scared.  It's not time to be scared.  You're in the magickal world, and this is what you've opened yourself up to.  Step up and remember that they're in YOUR house and you control who comes and goes through it.
2. Eliminate openings to your home.  That means, close windows, doors, and fireplace flues.  Turn off your computer (electrical wires are a very common pathway for spirits to travel through), turn off your A/C (your A/C or heater is pulling air from outside the house), turn off cell phones, and if possible hit the breakers.
3. Break out the candles.  Candlelight is the best way to actually see the spirits that you're dealing with.  Oftentimes, things that you won't see will be visible under candle light, and if this isn't true in your instance, it will at least bring you closer to the magickal being that you are which should in turn bring you more usable power.  Make sure to keep that lighter on you though in case the candles go out (lights go out as well so it's not making things worse for you).
4. Light some incense.  I would suggest some foul smelling stuff with Frankincense in it if possible.  I've included a recipe for a good one that's worked many times for me.  You're doing this for two reasons, smoke also helps bring the creepy crawlies out into the open and many scents are crippling for them.  I say to forget the sage completely.  It may work on some things, but people use it too much for it to be much use against anything that's been around for long.  The same goes with salt.  That trick got played out a long time ago.  They're good for cleansing, but not much use for entities.
5. Optional: Grab a bit of liquor from the cabinet.  It may sound stupid, but sometimes that little bit of liquid courage really helps to remind yourself that you're in control.  It works for me, but not my wife so use it if you feel like it'd help.
6. Now, it's time to make a decision.  Are you ready to deal with the entity once and for all?  If yes, then you need to get ready to pit your will and magickal ability against the entity.  If not, then your goal is to kick it out of your house.  

Procedure for Removing an Entity

1. Make a circle.  This time it's to protect yourself rather than the spell.  Whatever you're dealing with is probably going to get very pissed off very quickly and you'll want some protection.  The same ideas are used but the purpose is a little different.  After you do this, you should start to feel a lot safer.  The most important part of winning any kind of battle with an entity is regaining confidence.  If you're scared, you're going to lose.
2. Now, call on any kind of spirits that you think will help you.
3. Force the spirit out.  Use visualizations, but speak your will out loud.  Tell the spirit or entity to leave now and to never come back.  Feel your power seeping into every inch of the house and burning everything that is not yours.  This won't always work forever, but it will more than likely make the spirit leave for a while.
4. If this doesn't work, feel your circle expanding and continue to speak your will.  Your circle should continue to expand until it covers the entire area.  Light some more incense and continue speaking.  Feel your power flow from your voice into the area.  Your voice is what will make the entity leave.
5. After the entity is gone, make sure to thank all of your helping spirits (you'll need them again later) and close the circle just like always.
6. Now it's time to think about how to get rid of the entity once and for all if it comes back.

How to Bind a Spirit

There are two ways to keep an entity from every coming back is to either destroy it (very very difficult) or to bind it to something and then make sure that no one touches that item (not so difficult).  So this will be a guide to binding the spirit properly so that you don't have to deal with it again.

1. Make two circle--one around you and one around the entire area.  The tricky part here is that you have to make the one around the area a backwards circle that keeps things from leaving.  I would position crystals or something similar around the area as "foundation points" to hold the circle strongly.  The first circle (the one around you) needs to be a normal one to protect yourself.
2. You will need a container and something that will absorb energy to put inside of it.  A good example would be an iron or steel "tin" box with salt and silver coins inside of it.  The iron keeps things from leaving and the silver and salt will hold the energy inside of it.
3. Now, you will want to light incense to weaken the entity.  If you know of any other weaknesses it has from your research this would be the time to utilize them.  Call for help from any spirits or entities that you believe would help you.  The purpose is to weaken the entity as much as possible without overextending yourself.  This is the part where you break down its shields so that you can control it.
4. You need to verbally speak down to the entity.  You need to turn the tables on it so that you scare it.  You want it to be trying to run with no where to go.  Tell it things like "This is the last time you'll torment me again."  You have to show your power because entities work just like people.  When they start to get scared, you start to gain power over them.
5. Be ready for it to start acting like it's cornered.  Wild animals will strike viciously when cornered and entities will do the same.  That means, things like candles going out suddenly.  Items flying in the room.  Loud noises and physical pains.  The main thing to remember is that you cannot get scared and you cannot lose focus.
6. Push the container out of your inner circle and visualize the entity being pulled into the vortex inside of the container.  If you have a wand or athame or any other focusing item, this would be the part where you utilize it.  Again, force the entity into the container with your voice.  Remember that sound is a very powerful tool, and it's one that most entities cannot utilize.
7. You have to get the entity into the container.  As soon as you feel like you've successfully done this, hurry and close the lid.  You must NOT open the container again.
8. Now, you must dispose of the container in a way that it won't be touched again for a very long time.  That could mean putting it into a lake, burying it in some random pasture, or actually visiting a dump and putting it there.  Don't throw it away because the trash truck compacts the trash and will more than likely open it in the process, effectively letting the entity out to torment you again.

As I promised, here is the rather simple incense that I use regularly.  I got the recipe from The Complete Book of Incense, Oils and Brews by Scott Cunningham.  It has tons of other incense recipes as well which you could try out.

Clearing Incense
3 parts Frankincense
3 parts Copal
2 parts Myrrh
1 part Sandalwood

Remember, this isn't a good one for making your house smell good by any means, but it's definitely harsh on the entity's senses.  And a little bit goes a long way.  You don't want to be coughing up a lung while you're trying to get rid of a nasty spirit.

Hopefully this was a good primer on emergency defensive magick and that it helped you gain a better understanding of what to do in the case of an entity arriving inside your door without your permission.  If you've got other ideas or questions, feel free to post a comment.  And remember to subscribe to get updates whenever I post another blog!

Defensive Magick: Spell Protection

When are you most vulnerable? When are you most open? When you're chopping veggies for that stew? Definitely not. It's when you open yourself up and release all of that power for the world to use. Rituals. Healing. Calling down a spirit.

This is what brings us to the current topic: how to defend yourself when you're most open.

The most important part is to remember that the goal is first and foremost to protect yourself and your spellwork from influence. The spellwork always comes after this because if it's been influenced or you've been influenced, the spellwork will either be worthless or may even be altered to something that you really don't want.

A few examples of spellwork protection are the Magickal Circle, the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, and the Greater Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram. There are many variations of course, but they all follow a basic system.

• Creating a sphere of protection
• Calling other entities/powers to hold the protection
• Rules within the sphere of protection

Creating a Sphere of Protection

The first step is creating and naming the area that you wish protected.  This should encompass the entire area that you will be working within.  There will be entities and unwanted energy around if you are doing magick with large amounts of energy, and so every tool, person, and candle should be within the sphere.  I call this a sphere rather than a circle for a reason.  It should have both a height above you and a depth below you both to limit the expenditure of energy and to be clear about how the space is defined.

The way that you create the space is not all that important and all paths vary in how they do it to some degree.  Oftentimes it is through visualization of a circle starting at one point and encircling the participants.  It then will dome over and under them to finish the sphere.  Others use physical circles through a circle of candles, salt (I don't recommend this, refer to my post on Salt), or just chalk drawing on the floor.  Still others will use reference points such as candles, statues, or people and visualize the circle connecting them.  It's really up to you as to how you do it.

Naming the space is as simple as simply saying that this space is sacred and using words to again create the space.  Saying something as simple as "This space is sacred and we will not allow any outside influences inside" is often good enough.  The verbal part is very important because it cements your intentions into place.  While speaking, be very aware of the moment and let power flow through your words to hold the sphere in place.

Calling Powers to Hold the Protection

You're doing some pretty heavy magick.  You want to create a change in the universe regardless of whether everyone else in the world thinks it's impossible.  You are suspending your belief in the laws that society has imprinted on you from birth.  You're healing a person who modern medicine says can't be healed.  This is something that you've got to focus on completely, but you're worried about holding the circle together as well.  How do you do this?  Well you delegate of course.

You can delegate a member of the participants to hold the sphere.  This is very common in group settings, but I and the majority of Pagans do most of the spellwork solo.  This is where calling the watchtowers or elements or gods or goddesses or whatever comes in.  You call for beings or powers to hold the circle for you.  This is something you should think about pretty seriously if you're new because you can't just call Athena or Thor to hold the circle for you if you have no relationship with them.  That's why most traditions call elements or some power source rather than a deity.  I would look into some of the more commonly used systems before going off on your own.

The Rules While Within the Space

The rules are whatever you make them as long as they're intelligent rules.  Everyone has their accepted rules, but those rules are strictly upheld.  These are to protect the participants in the case of something unexpected happening.  Once a rule is set, it is imperative that it not be broken under any circumstance.  A couple of the important ones that are common are:

• Don't leave the space.  This is to make sure that the sphere isn't broken by you crossing the boundary.  This means that if you have to pee and the choice is either to leave the circle to pee or pee your pants, you should probably pee your pants.  Remember that the reason for the protection is to protect in a worst case scenario, and a worst case scenario could be that there is an entity outside the sphere that is manipulating you.
• No inviting entities into the space.  This is because once an entity is in the space, you have absolutely no protection from them.  This process also gives an opening for others to enter.  The proper way to invite entities to the space is to have a specified space outside the protected area for them to interact with the participants.  Some traditions (especially Wiccan traditions) invoke spirits while all participants are still in the circle, but I personally disagree with this practice.

There are plenty of other rules that people use, and if you've got one please post it as a comment.  I'd love to have a few new ideas for my ritual protection, so any kind of ideas on defensive magick and spell protection would be very appreciated.

Defensive Magick: Daily Protection

Every day you walk through a world that is filled to the brim with emotions and energy--energy that you really don't need any part of.  Your neighbors had a fight.  Your boss is pissed at not getting the promotion.  The girl in front of you at the grocery store just broke up with her boyfriend.  These are all negative energies that are mixing and mingling with your perfectly happy and excited energy giving you all sorts of random emotions that don't make sense.  This is the reason to do daily protections to keep you happier and free of all of the swirling negativity in the world.  This is the simplest and oftentimes, one of the most neglected types of defensive magick.

The simplest way to do a daily protection is to simply stand in front of the mirror and visualize something that covers your entire body.  I've heard all sorts of things ranging from a cloak to a force-field like shield surrounding them.  Feel it harden into place and any time you think about it, reinforce that shield.

The next addition that you probably want to do is the purification step.  This will cleanse yourself of the negativity that has built up throughout the night (and maybe the day before if you forgot yesterday's protection).  The easiest way to do this is to simply take a bath and feel the water cleansing you.  The key to this step is being in the moment and really feeling the negativity and stress wash away from you.  Bonus points if you're using a cleansing and purifying essential oil or scent in your soap (double bonus points for homemade soap specifically designed for this purpose).

Yes, these work and they work well.  On the other hand, these are things that are easy to forget.  If you have an action that you do every day, integrate that into the ritual.  The easiest for many people is to charge a piece of jewelry or an item you wear every day with shielding properties.  Cologne and perfume work as well (especially if you add a bit of protective essential oil to it).  I'm sure that deodorant would too, I just have an issue with putting plastic into a ritual setting.





In order to charge the object, sit down in a quiet place.  You can do whatever ritual stuff you deem important like adding candles, making a circle, etc.  Now, build up that shield visualization.  Feel the strength of it surrounding you.  Once you know that it's as strong as you can make it, push that shield into the item.  Now anytime you need to, just draw some energy/shield from it.  I'm a very big fan of the jewelry technique because the jewelry will add to the strength of it.  Some good types of jewelry would be anything that is gold, anything that has a red or yellow stone.  If possible it should be something that touches the skin because skin contact facilitates any kind of energetic work.

This is the simplest of the defensive magick techniques, but daily protection is a very important part of keeping your energy and emotions clean of any other influences.  Check back tomorrow for tips and ideas for how to effectively shield your magickal/spell work!

Defensive Magick: An Introduction

I've decided that in order to really have a complete magickal website I need to have a few sections that people can use as a reference tool.  One of the most important things that everyone new to the magickal world should begin to learn is defensive magick.  This should be done before you ever step inside a circle or open yourself up to the things that go bump in the night.

The most important parts to understand are the basics.  From this, you can create your own defensive techniques without using other people's ideas (though I still look at other people's ideas for inspiration).  Oftentimes there will be entities or energies that don't respond well to normal techniques so you'll have to use different ones that no one's thought of before but they'll still rely on the basics.

So why do you need to use defensive magick?  

Well, for those of you who are not that worried about entities or "curses" (negative energy), you will still need to insulate your spells and yourself from other energies.  This is basically the same as keeping the smell of a rotten egg away from your amazing chicken alfredo while you're eating it.  The rotten egg may not be actively touching the alfredo but the smell is ruining the experience and the taste.  Magick is easily influenced and so you have to make sure that there aren't any external forces playing with your intentions.

That's not even taking into consideration the simple fact that there is negativity influencing us all over.  We're a relatively negative culture and we're constantly bombarded by anger, grief, and envy. By keeping that negativity away from us we can keep our own energy clean.

There are also the entities that we all occasionally cross paths with (some more than others).  Entities are just like people, some will have bad intentions, others are just passing by, and others will try to help you.  The ones that have bad intentions are probably going to have to be forced from your space and a lot of these techniques will be of use.

The basic idea of all defensive magick is to put a shield around yourself and/or your space and to cleanse the area inside of that shield forcing everything else out.  The most commonly talked about defensive magick technique is that of a magickal or witch's circle if you're looking for an example.

The technique you use will depend on your purpose.  The three major purposes would be:

• Daily Protection
• Ritual/Spell Protection
• Emergency Protection

Daily Protection deals with keeping yourself cleansed of all the negativity in the world.  So you don't want to spend a lot of time each day on this, but it should be a part of your wake up routine every morning even if you aren't leaving the house. Part of it should be a purifying and immediately afterwards a shielding .  There probably isn't much in the way of tools when doing this.

Ritual/Spell Protection is the use of defensive magick to keep outside influences from interfering with spellwork and rituals.  This will be a much more intricate purifying process as well as a more ritualistic shielding process.  This is because energy and entities are drawn to energy sources, which you'll be a very significant one.  You have to keep everything else out while still being able to put energy into your spell purpose.  Oftentimes there will be a single person in charge of maintaining the circle during group rituals.  There will probably be a lot of tools used to help in creating and maintaining a space.

Emergency Protection is generally used when dealing with an entity that is not wanted.  This will be the sole purpose of your magickal work and therefore will use most of your energetic strength.  The key to emergency protection is deciding whether you want/can deal with the entity adequately at the moment.  If you decide that you can't, the purpose of the emergency protection is to get it away from you until you can deal with it.  If you can, then the purpose is to keep it there until you can make sure that it won't come back. Entities tend to know when to run away, so sometimes it is necessary to make that shield backwards keeping everything inside of it.

The next part will be over daily defensive magick.  Check back regularly or subscribe to find out more about how you can keep yourself from soaking up all the negativity in the world!

Magickal Inks

The pen and paper is the medium for making language physical.  It is the only way to turn this intangible into permanence, and through this process can turn the magick within the spoken word into a magickal item.  This can be done through sigil work, pictures, or through simple words.  We adorn our altars with specially anointed candles, home made athames, wands carved by our own hands, and all manner of spiritually meaningful items.  It is my belief that if we're doing all of this, then it only seems natural to want a handmade or spiritually meaningful ink to be the medium for converting the power of the spoken word into a tangible item to be used in our spellwork.


There are a few ways to make your own inks and I'm not going to go into all of them mainly because there's just wayyy too many possible ways to do it.  I will give you a few ideas that are easy for the normal person to do and don't require you to special order some nonsense from a small village in western Siberia.


India Ink
1 part lampblack
1 part gum arabic
10-15 parts alcohol (depending on how thick you want your ink)


This is the classic ink that we've heard of in history books and in movies.  Lampblack is simply the carbon (soot) that comes off of a candle in the smoke.  To "catch" it, simply hold a spoon over the candle and let the smoke hit it.  Every so often, you have to "scrape" the spoon clean.  I would suggest using two spoons or a spoon and a fork (wow this sounds like some kind of messed up instructions on eating lunch), one spoon for catching and the other for scraping the lampblack into the container you're going to use.  Once you have a good amount of lampblack, just add the alcohol and then the gum arabic.  Gum arabic is a thickening agent sold at Hobby Lobby and pretty much any craft stores (look for it near the paint section).  


You can also crush up berries or boil them and use this as an ink, or you can use the ink sacs from squid or cuttlefish.  Add a little gum arabic to thicken these up if you need it thicker for your writing utensil.


Currently, there are only three regularly referenced "magickal inks":  bat's blood ink, dove's blood ink, and dragon's blood ink.  Here are the recipes for them if you're interested.


Bat's Blood Ink
2 parts dragon's blood resin
1/2 part myrrh resin
2 drops indigo color
2 drops cinnamon oil
12 parts alcohol
1/2 part gum arabic


One tip on the creation of this ink is to make sure to dissolve the resins in the alcohol first.  This takes a lot less time than waiting for them to dissolve once you have the rest of the ingredients in.


This ink is supposed to push for chaos, discord and all things not so pleasant.  I'm not sure how useful it is since I've never made it.  


Dragon's Blood Ink
1 part dragon's blood resin
15 parts alcohol
1 part gum arabic


This one is for power and strength in spellwork.


Dove's Blood Ink
1 part dragon's blood resin
2 drops cinnamon oil
10 parts alcohol
2 drops bay oil
1 part gum arabic
2 drops rose oil


This ink is used for love, giving thanks, and all things that come from the heart or are born from a place of innocence.


Now onto my personal spin (you knew it was coming, didn't you?).  I typically don't used any of the marketed inks, but that's simply because I like the process of creating something of my own.  You can put any kinds of incense, oils, or gemstones in the ink.  One unique way that I add my own touch is to crush up actual herbs or gemstones and put them into the ink.  Granted that these will not be suspended or put onto paper, but you put bay leaves in a stew even though no one actually wants to eat them.  The idea's the same.  More than likely these inks will sit for a while and their "tastes" will intermingle.  In truth, simply adding these personal touches to a craft store bought ink is better than using the ink by itself if for no other reason than because when we create something, a part of ourselves is put into our creation.


Also, if you want to a bit more power to it, you can always put a drop or two of blood into it.  There are some things you might want to think about before you do that though.  Check out a few of my precautions in Blood, Power and Magick and Blood, Power and Magick Pt. II.

Pagan Economics and its Problems November 5, 2011

There is a growing number of Pagans in the US and many of them want to incorporate this into their daily lives aka their source of income.  For some reason, almost no Pagan businesses are ever as profitable as their non-spiritual counterparts.  I’d like to go into a bit of depth on each of the types of businesses before coming to any major conclusions as to the why and how we can change this.

Manufacturing

The manufacturing business is a very common business for Pagans.  This represents all those that craft by hand as well as major manufacturing companies that create the commonly sold things such as bumper stickers.  The problem with this business is that nearly all of the things manufactured for Pagans are one-time-buys.  No one buys the same necklace twice or the same athame twice.  The only major items that people buy multiple times are candles, incense, herbs, soaps, oils, “spell kits”.  Yes, this is a very viable business, but the problem is that retailers are the ones that buy these products and they are having a hard time which in turn means that manufacturers are having a hard time as well.

Retail

This is the path that most end up going down and nearly everyone tries at some point.  Brick and mortar stores tend to have a lot of problems due to the lack of large concentrations of Pagans in any single area.  They also have far more expenses than online stores and therefore have to have higher prices.  They’ll never be able to compete with online drop-shippers or large chains on price simply because they cannot buy products in large enough quantities to get significant discounts.  The internet retail stores have trouble because most products are one time buys and there is A LOT of competition.  It also seems that the products do not differ enough to allow the consumer to be loyal to a single company because of their outstanding product lines.  This is one of the biggest and most profitable of the current Pagan businesses especially when coupled with a service regardless of the hardships that they have to deal with.

Information  

There are thousands of people trying to make money off of a Pagan blog, website, magazine, or newsletter.  A few make it, but most end up having to have another job.  There are very few people that make their living off of this, and the only real section of people in this industry that stand out are the authors of Pagan 101 books because they can profit off of the people who are not living off of the Pagan industries.  Though it sounds very pyramid scheme-ish, it’s the truth.  Booksellers like Barnes and Nobles sell very few books other than introductory books to Paganism, and these are the places that make authors the most money.

Education

There is only one currently utilized outlet for this business:  ”magick schools”.  These are almost exclusively online businesses that offer the same type of information as a Pagan 101 book and again, they are profiting off of the new kids on the block.  They offer very little (from my very limited experience with them) other than an online teacher. This is not a bad idea but the truth is that there are many other paths that should at least be tested in this business.

Health Care

This revolves almost entirely on a combination of massage therapy, energetic healing (Reiki for example), acupuncture, and acupressure.  There are other styles of “New Age” healing that we’ll consider, but these are the main ones.  There is an extremely large number of people practicing these techniques both in the Pagan world and outside of it, and so the competition is rather stiff.  It is also a business that is not extremely expandable and so those that are not business minded tend to have a very difficult time because they have to be both good at their practice as well as running a business which for many people is a difficult thing to do.

Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation

There is a very large number of these ranging from tourist style entertainment (think Rennaisance Faire) to musical entertainment to general artisans.  The problem with these businesses is that they’re very limited to the number of people in their niche (Paganism) unless they can branch out into mainstream (Ren Faires).  There’s not much else to say other than they will have problems until the population of Pagans increases dramatically.

Accomodations, Food

There’s very few accommodations or food/drink locations that cater to specifically Pagans.  Yes, there are some but they are very few and far between and I have never actually been to one so I have very few things to note other than the fact that our sub-culture is far too spread out in most places for these places to be very profitable unless they can also reach the mainstream.

Professional Services

Professional services would be consultants, financial advisors, and the likes.  The problem with trying to start something like this that specializes in the Pagan business world would be that there are very few Pagan businesses that can afford them.  Its a business that we desperately need, but not something that we’ll likely find any time soon.

Conclusions

There are a lot of conclusions that we can draw from this analysis.  We can all see that an increase in Pagan population would without a doubt make Pagan businesses more profitable and the world is headed in that direction, but we are still a long way away from seeing a large increase in the profitability of brick and mortar stores and businesses. It seems as though more Pagan businesses need to adopt a larger service line in order to be profitable from the beginning.  Having a Pagan restaurant/bar that also sold massages in the back and had a “gift shop” (think cracker barrel) would probably have a better chance of profiting than a simple store because it would cause more impulse buying as well as combining the revenue from all of the possible options.  It would also create a much larger loyal customer base.  This would put more money into fewer hands allowing them to grow their business and in the future, make an impact in the non-Pagan community thus increasing the possible number of customers by increasing the number of Pagans.

Internet shops should push for more brand loyalty by increasing the number of unique items, increasing the number of consumable items, as well as increasing their ability to impact the Pagan community.

The key to everything involves the brick and mortar operations to increase impact on the non-Pagan community, making them more amiable to Pagans, and the internet operations to increase their impact on the Pagan community, making them more “Pagan only” whenever possible.  This would open up huge opportunities for everyone to profit from the increased spending into Pagan businesses.

Water of the Elements November 4, 2011

So I was thinking earlier about tools I’ve collected, been gifted, gifted, and used throughout my nearly 10 years of magick and I thought I’d let share one of them with you.  It was thought up and gifted to me by my aunt on a winter solstice around 5 years ago, and I used it for numerous years afterwards sparingly.  She gave me 4 glass bottles of water coming from the four elements which would lend the essence of water with a slant towards one of the other elements.  I’ll give you a more understandable explanation for each after I’ve written down my personal recipe for them.

Water of the Air

1 Glass Jar (needs to be glass) that is airtight.  Liquor bottles work perfectly.  Preferably it is dark tinted to reduce light.

1 Large feather such as an owl, vulture, or hawk

Collect rainwater from a single storm.  For those of us living in the desert, this may require a long wait or a trip to Seattle.  This also may mean that you need to put a bucket outside to catch enough water.  Once the water is in the jar, stir it with the feather.  Put whatever air energy you feel is needed into it.  I’m not really one for the rhyming spells or chants so throw that in there if you’re that kind of person as well.

This will be used to represent the airy parts of water:  the fluidity, hurricanes, cold emotions, and all things that go between the water and air such as seabirds, rain (yeah, I know…), and storms of all sorts.

Water of the Earth

1 Glass Jar–the same as the others

a handful of stones from a body of water or stones that represent water to you

The instructions are the same as the water of air except with the earth slant.

The important things to note when using this water is that it is of the earth and therefore represents things such as the body, water that is not in motion, creatures that travel between the earth and water (crabs for example), and emotional ties to objects.

Water of Fire

1 Glass Jar–the same as the others 

1 pot

1 match

The instructions for this one are a bit different.  First boil natural spring water (bottled water works).  Put this water into the jar.  Then light the match and feel the heat and fire flowing into the water.  Put the match out in the jar and pull the matchstick out.  There will be ashes in the water and that’s okay.

This is the combination of opposites.  It is a representation of the “hot” emotions such as passion, anger, and love.  It is also a representation of the idea of alchemy and the combination of opposing forces.  This is a tricky one to really explain with examples.

Water of Water

1 Glass jar

In this, the procedure is very simple.  You just need either water from a very large lake or water from the sea.  I’d suggest that you make sure they are as clean as possible (run them through a coffee filter or 10), but other than that just pour it into the jar and close the lid.

This is the most difficult one to explain the representation on in my opinion.  It has to do with all things purely of water.  Dreams, water bound creature, watery emotions if that makes any sense, and of course water itself.

All of these waters will work for the water aspect in a ritual, but they are specifically designed for certain types.  For example, I would use the Water of Fire in a ritual to bring about more passion in your life but it wouldn’t be a good one for bringing more wealth into your life.  On the other hand, if you wanted to a very water based ritual, you could use all of the waters as representatives of the 4 elements.

You have to be careful not to let them into the light very much because algae will start to grow if they’re exposed to much light and nobody wants to use water in a ritual that’s got weird green stuff in it.

Anyways, good luck and if you have any questions or thoughts, give us a few comments.

God, Reality, Myth, Fiction…What Do You Choose? November 2, 2011

What is reality to you?  Is it a bearded man sitting on a golden throne in heaven?  A group of drunk and disorderly gods and goddesses sitting on top of a mountain?  Is it the media and science’s portrayal of reality where we sit in cubicles until we’re too old to see the computer screen clearly and then we’re put into nursing homes until we die?

My reality is none of the above and though I’m sure my regular readers know, I hold to no reality for very long.  It is constantly shifting to fit my current understanding of the world.

“Knowledge is changeable.  Truth is eternal.  It is disastrous to confuse them.”   –Madeleine L’Engle

This quote is of the utmost importance to all that practice magick because although our society teaches rigidity in belief, magick teaches us fluidity.  It is impossible to fly when you cannot bend your own reality to accept that it is possible.  For anyone who has ever practiced magick knows that the reality that we are taught is flawed and therefore cannot be the truth.  It is the magician’s quest to constantly search for that truth, to follow meandering roads to their ends and to always search for the one that leads to that golden door of enlightenment.

This post is not a simple post.  It isn’t about a simple topic such as athames or tarot cards or even the meaning of life.  This is about what lies beneath all of it.  The core answer of every question.  Truth.

“I’m going to paraphrase Thoreau here… rather than love, than money, than faith, than fame, than fairness… give me truth.”  Chris McCandless, Into the Wild

To the magician, everything is based on their current idea of truth.  If they believe that the truth allows them to fly, they will search for a way to do this.  They will always test, always make sure that something will work before they need this.  They gather tools and build their repertoires in this way, but in reality they are actually exploring the unknown and changing their reality to always get closer to the truth.

The end result is a culture of expanding minds, of modern day philosophers.  These expanding minds are the future of our society.  It is only so long before the rest of the world begins to see where these philosophers are headed.  Every day more and more government officials have ties to this culture from the small town officials to a Presidential hopeful, Gary Johnson.  The society that was dominated by science is slowly being influenced by the surrounding proof of flaws in our ideas of reality as well as the ever-encroaching mainstreaming of Pagan culture.  These modern day philosophers are not always authors or college graduates.  They are simply people who’s minds have been opened to the idea of other realities through trial and error.  We are the advisors, the councilors, the confidants of our society and we need to start acting like it.

The expansion of reality does not mean that we should live outside of the bounds of normal society.  We must still provide food for our families, must still keep clothes on our backs and should never become a burden for the ones we love.  We must somehow balance the knowledge that we have gained and the world that we have chosen with the world that we have been placed into.  Remember, we were placed in this time and society for a reason and it is our duty to fulfill our role.

Magick or Science? October 27, 2011

The Big Bang.  Quantum physics. Neutrinos.  The splitting of a proton.  Energy.  Massive Energy.  Fire.  Hurricanes.  Wind.  Waves.  A landslide.  Magick.

All of science has shown that magick doesn’t exist.  On the surface.  The science of the 1700′s, 1800′s, and 1900′s worked to understand the how’s and why’s of the world and to uncover the secret workings of what was considered “magick”.  They did an amazing job and the result is the world we live in.  Computers, cars, planes, and chemistry run our lives and give us the means to live our lives in comfort.  We discovered the atom (which actually is Latin for irreducible) and from there have manipulated them to nearly the maximum extent that they can be manipulated.

We discovered that an atom is not in fact irreducible.  There are two parts of an atom:  the nucleus and the electron cloud that surrounds it.  Imagine that an atom is the size of an orange.  The nucleus is smaller than one of the seeds.  The 1-160 electrons that make up the cloud are each the size of a speck of dust.  The rest is void space.  Okay, that’s kind of crazy but imaginable.  So an atom is 99% void space and 1% mass.

Now we get into the quantum physics part of it.  Through crazy testing that I’m not even going to begin to try to explain they’ve found that the nucleus’s parts (protons and neutrons) can be further broken apart into what are known as quarks.  Come to find out, they too make up only about 1% of the proton and neutron volume.  The rest is void space.  So within an atom, only 1% of 1% (that’d be .01% for the non math majors out there) is actual mass.  That is incredible.  So here’s an example of why that’s so incredible:  Think about an airplane.  It weighs hundreds of thousands of pounds and carries 150 people through the air, defying gravity.  Now think about it in terms of atoms.  For every square foot of metal, cut out all but a single piece of metal about 1/8th of an inch by 1/8th of an inch.  Oh yeah, and as thin as a hair.  That’s how much actual mass is there.  The rest is all just nothing.  It’s kind of mind blowing.

Now let’s look past that to what hasn’t been discovered and make an educated guess.  No one has ever broken apart a quark or atom (that I’ve ever heard of), but my guess is that there’s only about 1% of the quark that’s actually there and the rest is void space.  Do you see where I’m going with this?  Eventually you realize that there really isn’t anything out there.  Nothing takes up any space in actuality because there’s nothing really there.

Except energy.  There is motion and so there must be energy.  Even if an electron cloud is nearly all void space, it acts as an object.  It has force and it has volume.  Energy is the only thing that is real in the world.  Now my question to you is this:  how is the energy that is the world any different from the energy that is pulled through your body to create change in the world?  It isn’t.  It is all the same thing with different vibrational levels and different intention.

The next thing that needs to be thought about is the fact that our bodies are also made of atoms which means that truthfully we are made of nothing but energy.  And something else.   There has to be something else inside of us that allows us to be alive and different from one another.  This is the most logical and perfectly undeniable proof of the soul for lack of a better word.

So we are in essence, a soul that is somehow bound to energy.  This is pretty much exactly what the Eastern philosophies and religions have taught for thousands of years.  Now comes the true question of this blog:  what do we do with this information?

Well, as far as magick is concerned, this logic tells us that if we can control the energy of our body then why would we not be able to control the energy outside of this body?  Also, why would we not be able to transform the energy of a chair into the energy of an ice cube?  And furthermore, why is it that we don’t already know how to do this?

I don’t know.  Possibly it has to do with the fact that we are here for a reason and that reason doesn’t include having everything we want without any effort.  That’s about as far as I can get at 4 am.  I’d love to hear other people’s ideas on this.

The more important question to ask is this:  if we are all made up of energy, and the world is made up of energy, and our souls are simply tied to the energy that we inhabit, then what inhabits everything else?  I’d have to say that the idea of a Mother Earth or a God or the Universe or whatever other name you’d like to give it sure does sound pretty plausible when you put it into those terms.   If you take the first point and put it with this point, then one of the most obvious conclusions for me is this:  there is a reason we are here and there is some sort of design to all of this chaos that is our lives.

Okay, that’s as far as I’m going to get on this topic for now since I’m ridiculously exhausted from a long night of work and I’ve got to get ready to go back for a few more hours.  Let me know what you think.