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Elemental Balancing Ritual Creativity Month 23

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8-22-2020 I started reading Beyond Victim Consciousness today. It had been recommended by a friend and given recent events, I felt like it would be useful to take a look and see what might be applicable to myself. My first impression is that some of the perspectives the author shares reminds me of the Adlerian psychology espoused in The Courage to be Disliked, namely that you choose the perception you have as opposed to how trauma defines. I don’t fully agree with that perspective, but I also recognize how much my own trauma can become can excuse, which really isn’t useful, if I’m going to own my choices and the consequences of them. In that sense the perspective I bring to an event defines that event subjectively. And it is all to easy to use a given perception to justify your actions, choices, blamelessness or blame, so I’m really sitting with that. I’ll be curious to see how the rest of this book can inform my journey forward, as well as what I learn from the past.

8-23-2020 I read some more of Beyond Victim Consciousness tonight. Victim consciousness wants to be right, wants to protest, wants to control, wants to make others as we are and when they refuse we become angry and punish them. An internally focused perspective wants peace and accepts the situation as it is, recognizing that the perspective you apply to the situation dictates the experience of the situation.

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Why pop culture magic works

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I always find it interesting when critics of pop culture magic make the arguments that pop culture magic either can’t work or if it does work, the results aren’t as good as other systems of magic. I wonder why they make those criticisms, especially when its clear that for the most part they haven’t actually tried pop culture magic, and therefore don’t have any qualified experience to critique pop culture magic. The conclusion I’ve come to is that such critics attack pop culture magic because they feel threatened by the idea that pop culture magic my supplant their practice of magic. As a result, they feel the need to try and take pop culture magic down.

When I first started writing articles and later my first book Pop Culture Magick, I was on the receiving of similar criticisms. I was told I was reinventing the wheel and that pop culture magic wasn’t real magic. Nevertheless I continued writing articles and books and giving talks on the topic, because I knew there were other people practicing pop culture magic and I also had tangible results from using pop culture magic. And over the years I have heard from people who read my books and articles and told me how they didn’t feel so alone and realized that pop culture magic could be a viable path of magic, one where viable systems of magic could be developed and used.

The value of taking a break

I discuss why it can be helpful to take a break from your magical practice and share why I took a break recently.

I also share some big news at the end of the video.

Learn how magic works: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/home

Get Free-ebooks: http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

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Cobra Kai and Pop Culture Magic

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One of the most fascinating aspects of pop culture (and by extension pop culture magic) is how pop culture reinvents and refreshes itself. The most recent example that comes to mind is the show Cobra Kai, which was recently acquired by Netflix. This show takes place 30 years after the Karate Kid movie series and is an update on that series, which focuses on the characters from the first film (initially). I watched the entire series myself recently and like many other people got caught up in the Karate Kid saga again.

There’s two factors that make a given pop culture relevant for people who practice pop culture magic. One factor is the personal relevance you attribute to a given pop culture. People who are die hard fans of a pop culture will be so invested in that pop culture that it won’t matter if it is or isn’t relevant to other people.

Why internal work isn't always enough

I recently blew my life up. I’m not happy about it, but it’s my own fault, and it could’ve been avoided, but sometimes that’s the way things go. Nonetheless, one of the lessons I’ve taken from this recent experience is how important it is to recognize that sometimes internal work isn’t enough, especially when you’re dealing with situations of stress and trauma that you haven’t fully processed.

Meditation and other forms of internal work are good for working through issues, but one of the pitfalls that accompanies any form of internal work is that it is subjective. You may be thinking you’re doing okay because of the work you’re doing, but actually there may be patterns you aren’t seeing or recognizing as problematic. When that happens you can end up sabotaging yourself.

Walking with Spirits is now Available

BOOK 2: WALKING WITH SPIRITS: HOW TO WORK WITH SPIRITS AND GET CONSISTENT RESULTS IS NOW AVAILABLE!

In Walking with Spirits, I share my process for connecting and working with spirits that enables you to get consistent results, while building collaborative relationships with the spirits you work with.

Working with spirits doesn’t have to involve the coercion of spirits that you find in conventional approaches to spirit work. What I share is an alternative approach that enables you to develop a friendly relationship with the spirits you work with and allows you to get results. Instead of trying to force a spirit to do something for you, you’ll learn the following:

  • How to create a rapport with spirits that allows you to become allies.

  • Why a co-equal relationship with spirits is better than any other type of relationship you could form.

  • What the problems are with conventional Western spirit work techniques such as what you find in the grimoires.

  • How to use experiential embodiment to connect with spirits.

  • How to use a simplified approach to invocation and evocation that allows you to work with spirits and get results.

If you’re ready to learn a different approach to working with spirits, where you don’t create enemies, and instead have life long relationships where you and the spirits from working with each other, Walking with Spirits will show you a different path for working with spirits that gets you results.

Get the E-book
Get the Print book

Magical versus mundane solutions

In this video I discuss how to determine the best type of solution for a problem.

Learn how to troubleshoot your magical workings: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/how-to-troubleshoot-your-magic/

Get free e-books: http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

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Magic and Responsibility

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I talk about responsibility and magic

Learn how magic works at: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/home

Get Free books at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

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Can you still practice pop culture magic if the pop culture has been cancelled?

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The other day in the Pop Culture Magick Facebook group I asked the question: “Can you still practice pop culture magic if the pop culture has been cancelled?” I used the recent example of J. K . Rowlings and her comments on the Trans community as an example where someone might practice pop culture magic, but have an issue with what the creator of that pop culture said or did. could that person still work with the pop culture itself.

If you click the link above, you’ll get to see the responses to my question from the community. There were answers all across the spectrum on this issue and I feel like all of them were well considered. But here, I thought I would share my own answers to this question.

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Elemental Balancing Ritual Creativity Month 22

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7-22-2020 Today when I did my meditation the archangels told me that the next three months is all about an integration of everything I’ve done before with the Sphere of Art, as well as the Qi Gong I’m doing. “That’s more than enough work for you right there, especially with everything else you’ll be doing.” And they told me that all of this would continue to lay the ground work for transformation. So I accepted what they said and just focused on the integration. It is important to make time for the work you’ve done, to ground it and embody it in you and that time, for me, is right now.

7-23-2020 I’m rereading the Slight Edge and he makes an excellent point that changing how you think about what you do matters, because how you think about what you do dictates how you actually do it, and if you even do it. What makes a person successful at whatever they’re doing is the thought that seeds the actions and keeps them doing what needs to be done, even when the person is seeming to fail. It’s a good reminder for me.

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How to deal with Hostile Spirits

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Not all spirits have your best interests at heart. Sometimes you’ll encounter hostile spirits and in such a situation you need to figure out what to do about the hostile spirit, because if you don’t do anything, it’s going to make your life miserable. So how do you handle a hostile spirit?

Let’s first consider the reasons a spirit might be hostile. The first reason could be because the spirit is inimical to life. It’s function is about destruction and breaking things down and you happen to be in the way. It’s nothing personal. It just doesn’t want anything to do with you and you happen to be in the way of its function.

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Dissolving Patterns in Internal Work

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How to recognize patterns in your life and how to dissolve them.

Learn how magic works: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/home

Get Free ebooks at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

Can Magic Ruin your Life?

I explore the question of whether or not magic can ruin your life and talk about change, internal work, and long term design.

Learn how to apply internal work to your life: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/internal-work/

Get free books at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

Learn how to do internal work
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Walking with Spirits is available for Pre-order

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Walking with Spirits is available for pre-order!

In Walking with Spirits, I share my process for connecting and working with spirits that enables you to get consistent results, while building collaborative relationships with the spirits you work with.

Working with spirits doesn’t have to involve the coercion of spirits that you find in conventional approaches to spirit work. What I share is an alternative approach that enables you to develop a friendly relationship with the spirits you work with and allows you to get results. Instead of trying to force a spirit to do something for you, you’ll learn the following:

  • How to create a rapport with spirits that allows you to become allies.

  • Why a co-equal relationship with spirits is better than any other type of relationship you could form.

  • What the problems are with conventional Western spirit work techniques such as what you find in the grimoires.

  • How to use experiential embodiment to connect with spirits.

  • How to use a simplified approach to invocation and evocation that allows you to work with spirits and get results.

If you’re ready to learn a different approach to working with spirits, where you don’t create enemies, and instead have life long relationships where you and the spirits from working with each other, Walking with Spirits will show you a different path for working with spirits that gets you results.

Pre-order your copy

How Results and Experiences can go hand in hand in magic

In results based magic, the result is king (or queen). The result you achieve dictates the success of your magical work or indicates you weren’t successful. It’s a simple principle, yet its effective because it establishes an obvious metric that can indicate whether your magic was successful or not. In fact, in my troubleshooting process, I use the result as the initial mechanism for troubleshooting, because whether your magic is successful or not, you always get a result. Even if that result is that you don’t achieve anything of what you hoped to achieve, that lack of a result is still an indicator of something and can help you uncover what the problem is in your magical working.

But I think something that is equally important in magical work, but often overlooked in the rush for results, is the actual experience that the magician has while doing the magical work. The experience itself is essential to magic, but it can be overlooked when we’re so fixated on the result that we don’t pay as much attention to the actual magical work. It can also be easy to take that work for granted, especially if we’ve done that work a few times. For instance, if I decide to work a spell I’ve done a couple times before, I might pay less attention to the experience because I’ve already done that work a couple times and I “know” what to expect.

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How to do internal work around long term issues

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I share how to do internal work around long term issues in your life and explain why you can't always resolve those issues in one shot.

Learn how to do internal work: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/p/internal-work

Get free ebooks on magic at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

Learn how to do internal work

Book Reviews March Through August 2020

Book Review: Pain Free by Pete Egoscue (Affiliate link)

I picked this book up on the recommendation of a colleague and I’ m glad I did. The author does an excellent job of explaining why are feeling pain in your body and then shows you simple stretches you can do daily to relieve the pain. Not only did this book help me understand the source of chronic pain I’ve dealt with, but it also freed me of that pain, through the stretches. I’ve noticed an overall improvement in my health since using this book and I highly recommend it.

Book Review: Six Ways by Aidan Wachter (Affiliate link)

This book is packed with exercise and concepts that will keep you busy. I would highly recommend it for anyone starting or with some experience who wants to challenge what they know to discover what they can learn. Aidan draws from a variety of perspectives and his experiences and makes the work approachable for his readers. Don't just read this book. Work the exercises and practices and you'll see your magical practice transform.

Book Review: Egregores By Mark Stavish (Affiliate link)

This is more of an academic treatise on egregores than anything else, but the author presents an interesting take on the subject and explores examples of different egregores and how those egregores can effect the people that work with them, for better or worse. He also presents ways to break the connection with an egregore. It’s a good book on the topic and worth giving a read to better understand the nature of egregores.

Book Review: How to Meet and Work with Spirit Guides by Ted Andrews (Affiliate Link)

This was the first book I ever read on magic. I recently re-read this book and even reading it many years later, a lot of the material ages well. Some of it would now be considered culturally appropriative, but overall the material is solid and the techniques and practices work. If you’re wanting an introduction to the spirit world this is a good book to read.

Book Review: Endless Ideas by Sean Platt and Neeve Silver (affiliate link)

If you feel creatively stumped for ideas, this book is a must read. While most of the practices they describe in the book are ones I already do, I can vouch for the fact that they work because I have a ton of creative ideas. What’s nice is that while this book is focused on generating ideas for writing, you can apply the concepts and techniques to any discipline and get similar results.

Book Review: Opening the Energy Gates of your Body by Bruce Frantzis (affiliate link)

This is an excellent book to read with easy to follow exercises that can help you start learning qi gong. The author does a great job of breaking down the actions you need to take, along with example diagrams and pictures. It’s a good supplement to in person or video training and what it really teaches you is how to cultivate the qi in your body. I have done these practices and benefited greatly from them.

Book Review: Living Spirits by BJ Swain (Affiliate link)

This is a comprehensive exploration of Western occult magic practices with spirits. The author does a good job laying out how various western practices work and its clear he’s researched the subject extensively (as well as done the practices). I like the analyses he provides in the appendices and found the book to overall be thought provoking. Even when I didn’t agree with the author, I really respected the way he presented the material and how accessible he made it. If you want to understand Western spirit work practices this is a great book to pick up.

Want to actually do this, not just read about it?

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If you want help with a specific situation, work with me one to one.

The Sigil Chain Technique

In mid June 2020, I developed the Sigil Chain technique. I created this technique because I had hit a point in my day job where I was feeling really burned out with that job and also feeling like there was no end in sight. At the same time I was also feeling frustrated with the lack of recognition my work was getting and the fact that no one wanted to interview me about my latest books. I also have some long term plans I want to realize and all of this resulted me in creating a technique so I could expedite my freedom from the day job, get some recognition and awareness for my writing and start turning my long terms plans into realities.

The first thing I did was sigilize all the known variables affecting the situation. I also included a sigil for unknown variables, just in case. As you can see in the picture above, there’s no lines connecting the sigils like you would do in my comic book sigil method or my sigil web method. The reason for that is that I wanted to make this particular sigil method non-linear, instead of linear. I thought it might prove to be an interesting experiment.

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How to dissolve shock

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I discuss how to recognize and undo shock and other internal blockages as well clear out the energy in your external environment.

Learn how magic works at magical experiments university: https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/

Get free books at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books

The Importance of Practice and Integration

I discuss the importance of practice and integration and why you never fully learn something in one read through or watch through

Learn how magic works at https://magical-experiments.teachable.com/

Get free books at http://www.magicalexperiments.com/free-books