Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

It's getting on for midnight, so we can proceed with a new Magic Monday. Ask me anything about occultism and I'll do my best to answer it. Any question received by midnight Monday Eastern time will get an answer. (Any question received after then will not get an answer, and will likely just be deleted.) If you're in a hurry, or suspect you may be the 143,916th person to ask a question, please check out the very rough version 1.0 of The Magic Monday FAQ here.

The illustration? Another Rosicrucian diagram from the SRIA. At the center is the Sun, or rather the Solar Logos, surrounded by the planets and shining down its sevenfold ray onto the Earth. Above it are the spiritual hierarchies to which it belongs; around it is the demarcation between manifestation and the Unmanifest; and the line above the circle marks the archetypal forces that, in our system, manifest as the planets. 

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With that said, have at it! 

***This Magic Monday is now closed. See you next week!***

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

According to a 1992 Psychology Today article (https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/199207/bright-lights-big-mystery) there significant differences between the near death experiences reported by different cultures:

"* Many of the Africans interpreted the event as somewhat evil; half thought the experience signified that they were somehow "bewitched." Another called it a "bad women."
* Among 400 Japanese NDErs, many reported seeing long, dark rivers and beautiful flowers, two common symbols that frequently appear as images in Japanese art.
* East Indians sometimes see heaven as a giant bureaucracy, and frequently report being sent back because of clerical errors!
* Americans and English say they are sent back for love or to perform a job.
* Natives of Micronesia often see heaven as similar to a large, brightly lit American city with loud, noisy cars and tall buildings."

Do you have a sense of the occult reason for these divergent cultural and regional afterlife experiences?

[ecosophia]

The notion that everyone gets the same sort of afterlife experience is far from universal in world religions. As I see it, there are two factors involved. The first is that the mind normally assembles its view of the world according to culturally generated patterns, and this carries over into the afterlife. The second is that the next world is just as complicated and diverse as this one, and different areas of the theosphere vary according to your religious involvements and the spiritual terrain of the land in which you live.

A Strange Encounter

[(Anonymous)]

I had an interesting experience the other day: I was out for a walk and my thoughts turned to the Norse gods -- in think in relation to the virtues they exhibited -- and my thoughts wandered briefly to Loki as a kind of outlier: even when he does things with good outcomes, they're either done in a bad way or for bad reasons and the gods suffer as much as they benefit from it.

I had a sudden feeling that I needed to drop this line of thought, and I tried to get back to the other gods, but I felt a presence wanting me to acknowledge it. I got the sense that it was Loki. I told it to go away but it wouldn't. I should have invoked a holy symbol then and there but I felt that if it really was Loki then he's a god and it wouldn't do any good anyway (I now recognize that this was not exactly my thought). So I went along and soon had the thought: I can recognize the bad in the good things he does, why should I not recognize the good in the bad things he does?

As I thought about this, something still felt off. I felt hot, muggy, and a little confused, which I knew to be signs that I was dealing with a malign spirit. But hey, it was a hot and humid day. I struggled with whether or not to follow up on the thought and whether I was dealing with a god or something else.

I thought multiple times about tracing the sign of the hammer in case it was something malign but was stopped by a thought that I shouldn't do that and it wouldn't do any good. Finally I decided if this really was a god I was dealing with, he shouldn't mind me invoking a holy symbol, and so I did. The presence vanished immediately.

I'm not sure precisely what I encountered or what it means. Was it a demon pretending to be Loki, or Loki pretending to be a demon?

Re: A Strange Encounter

[ecosophia]

It's very hard to say, but it was certainly not a positive being. Next time it happens, draw the hammer symbol right away!

[(Anonymous)]

Do you know what kinds of effects wearing synthetic fabrics have on the subtle bodies? They feel weird and dead, and this seems like it can't be healthy...

[ecosophia]

You'd have to talk to a good clairvoyant to get a sense of exactly what they do, but I know the feeling. I wear natural fibers pretty much all the time, for exactly that reason.

Tired and Sad

[(Anonymous)]

Eleven weeks ago I lost a tooth I had been hoping to save. It was my third such experience in the past few years and I was bitterly disappointed. In fact, due to circumstances involving an incompetent public dental system and many weeks of ultimately pointless buildup, I was devastated.

But I did expect to recover after a while: a week or two, a few weeks at most. But that has not happened. Instead I have experienced more or less they may.

Last night online I heard a reading from a speech by Rudolf Steiner in which he mentions that a severed body part remains connected with the corresponding portion of the etheric body. And then I remembered prior discussions here and elsewhere concerning phantom limbs and their connection with the etheric body. And so I wonder: might the loss of a tooth, or indeed of several, coupled with conditions of great psychological stress, have depleted me etherically in some way? If so, what if anything can I do about it?

I have basic skills in HOGD rituals, adapted to Hellenic deities: the LBRP, circulatingq the light, invocation of the Sun, and my Hellenic answer to the Rose Cross. I believe they are sound adaptations.
I also have some acquaintance with the Tarot, of which I asked a few questions in my haphazard twenty-questions way:

Q: Am I thinking along the right lines in this matter?

A: VIII of Pentacles

Q: is there anything I can do about it?

A: V The Hierophant

Q: Is anything being done against me through my lost tooth, perhaps even magically?

A: Queen of Wands

Q: What is the best possible outcome?

A: XXI The World


My recollection of how I formulated the last question is imperfect and may be off a bit.

Should you happen to have any constructive comments or suggestions, I’d be very glad.

Re: Tired and Sad

[ecosophia]

In your place I'd perform the equivalent of the Rose+Cross ritual daily, and offer incense and prayers to whichever healing deity you feel closest to; the Hierophant as answer to your second question suggests that. It doesn't look as though anyone's using the tooth to get at you, for what it's worth.

[(Anonymous)]

Regarding your Hall of the Homeless Gods translation project -
Shirakawa-gō keeps coming up in my normally random screensaver, so your Hall of the Homeless Gods translation project post feels like a synchronicity.
(Of course, I don’t know what to make of it – as usual.)
Anyway – I ended up with a big bucket of questions about such a shrine that all point back to how do gods, people, and places relate to each other.
So… what’s a shrine? What does it do? How do druids relate to them?
Rhydlyd… er… Puce Jocular Aardvark, rather.

[ecosophia]

A shrine is a place that enshrines some object that forms a link between the divine and the human world -- in Shinto this is called a goshintai; in Christianity, it's a relic, and it has other names in other traditions. Because it has such an object, the shrine makes access to divinity easier than it is elsewhere.

-- Crimson Squamous Pangolin

Golden dawn

[(Anonymous)]

A few newbie Golden Dawn related questions:

1. What is the better material for a robe from a practical point of view: cotton or silk?

2. I understand that GD banishing rituals can disenchant magically charged items. How can one prevent that from happening?

3. This is more esoteric, but what actually happens when I banish or invoke an element in the LRP? If I inovke Earth does that mean e.g. I'm improving my health, or am I asking to run into more situations related to health. Because it makes a difference.

Re: Golden dawn

[ecosophia]

1) Cotton. Silk blocks magical energies, and you want the energies to flow through you in your ritual work.

2) Wrap the objects in silk or linen to preserve the charge. You want to do that anyway with any consecrated item.

3) When you banish or invoke an element with the pentagram rituals you either disperse the elemental force or you draw more of it toward you. The effect on your health will depend on your current state of elemental balance -- if you're way over in an Airy direction, invoking Earth will pull you back toward balance and better health, while if you're inbalanced in an Earthy direction invoking more Earth will make it worse.

[(Anonymous)]

Dear Mr. Greer,

I was hoping you could answer the following questions.

1. In the Weird of Hali Tree of Life (https://ecosophia.dreamwidth.org/44066.htm) there are objects listed outside the spheres (The Ring of Eibon for example). What are these referring to? Are they paths?

2. I would like to start commemorating certain people in my life who have died by lighting a candle in their memory. I was wondering if it is best to do this on the day of their birth or the day of their death?
I also was thinking of writing their name on a small piece of paper and putting it in front of the candle then burning this before the candle dies. Would burning the paper invoke the wrong idea?

Thank you for providing this forum.

[ecosophia]

1) No, they're additional attributes of the Spheres they are placed next to.

2) Their death day. That was their birth into the afterlife, and since they no longer have the body that was born on their former birthday, it doesn't have much connection to them any more. Yes, you can offer up a name paper that way.

Bronze knives

[weilong]

I was looking for non-ferrous knives for harvesting herbs for natural magic, and found this (page is in Japanese, but nice pictures):
https://native-works.shop-pro.jp/?pid=147176743

This full-time mountain man/part-time metallurgist claims to have reproduced the kind of bronze that the Greeks used for weapons (apparently, the normal brown bronze doesn't hold an edge well). Kind of expensive, but I thought it was interesting. The other bronze knives that I have see seem to be more decorative than functional.

If I may ask, what do people use in the way of non-ferrous blades for harvesting magical herbs? There are ceramic kitchen knives these days, and I suppose I could file the edge of a copper sheet.

Re: Bronze knives

[ecosophia]

I have a little bronze sickle, which has always been sharp enough for my needs.

Occult Philosophy of Imagination, Ancestor Worship, Grab Bag Questions

[jprussell]

Good evening,

My first two questions are inspired by diving back into Cosmic Doctrine after a long hiatus paired with a newly awakened religious practice. The last few are hopefully less involved. As always, I'm happy to hear from the commentariat as well.

• From your previous writings and my tiny experience with occult philosophy, my impression is that "imagination" is the combination of two different capacities on the astral plane: perceiving things that are already there and manipulating/crafting things. My question is: is there a difference in how "real" things on the astral plane are? For example, I would imagine that a God's presence in the astral is entirely "really there", something that has been part of the shared imagination of many people for a long time (like, I don't know, Disney Princesses?) might be "somewhat real", and things that I just think up on a whim and never come back to might be totally ephemeral. Is this at all an accurate way of thinking of things?


• Potentially related to the above: how to reconcile changing historical patterns of belief and worship with the exterior/"objective" reality of the Gods? An example from the tradition I'm most familiar with: from linguistic and comparative mythological evidence, it seems pretty likely that the Indo-Europeans worshipped a "Sky Father" who was king, used lightning as his weapon, and had some kind of role in guaranteeing right action in a social context. Later Indo-European-derived cultures have Gods that clearly derive from this Sky Father, but are also clearly differentiated from each other (Zeus/Tyr/Indra/etc). Any thoughts on such change/splitting besides that I ought to meditate on it?


• How does ancestor worship square with reincarnation? In /The Cosmic Doctrine/, Fortune warns about messing with the recently deceased, unless it is to help them on their way: would honoring my mother count as the kind of interference that would keep her from going on to where she needs to go?


• You've said before that Golden Dawn systems and trance work don't play nice together: what makes that the case? Also, does this apply to all ceremonial magic systems, or just GD-derived ones specifically?


• I'm reading a book (Neolithic Shamanism by Raven Kaldera and Galina Krasskova) which talks about "centering" and "grounding" exercises. For centering, they recommend the Four Fold Breath, and for grounding, an exercise where you visualize a root growing from the energy center at your perineum down into the ground and into the core of the earth, drawing energy up and pushing it back down. 1) is the "centering" and "grounding" terminology generally useful, or idiosyncratic to this book, and 2) if it is generally useful, is the Middle Pillar exercise a "grounding" exercise?


• In /World Full of Gods/, you mentioned the kind of universalizing Mircea Eliade and others engaged in with some skepticism - would you mind sharing your full view on Eliade and how useful his writings are from the standpoint of a believing/practicing polytheist in a particular tradition?


• In some previous Magic Mondays, you've talked about breath exercises as "where the rubber meets the road" - are there other breath exercises compatible with the GD tradition besides the four-fold breath? If so, any advice on how to incorporate them with a daily practice of LBRP, MP, Meditation, Divination?


• Besides The Cosmic Doctrine and The Doctrine and Ritual of High Magic, do you have a "top ~5-10 works of occult philosophy"?


• Are there any other bloggers and/or living authors on things occult and occult-adjacent that you can recommend?

Many thanks,
Aquamarine Transcendent Goblin

Re: Occult Philosophy of Imagination, Ancestor Worship, Grab Bag Questions

[ecosophia]

1) Two factors influence how "real" an astral form is. The first is how much time and effort has gone into building it up; the second is whether or not something from beyond the astral plane uses it as a vehicle. The image of a god has the reality is does because it's the vessel for a real entity from the spiritual planes, and also -- if it's a traditional image -- because worshippers have built it up with their imagination and devotion over the years.

2) You ought to meditate on it. ;-)

3) In many cultures you pray to an individual ancestor only for a certain fixed period after death -- say, thirty years -- and after that it's just "the ancestors" collectively that get prayers. That makes sense, since back the day you could count on having plenty of time out of incarnation. These days, not so much!

4) When I say "Golden Dawn" I don't mean all magical systems. Nor do I mean all trance-based systems -- the specific prohibition is against letting yourself be hypnotized. That messes with the developmen of the magical will.

5) "centering and grounding" are standard Neopagan practices. No, the Middle Pillar isn't the same thing.

6) Not when you've already asked five other questions! That would keep me busy for half an hour.

7) Er, no. Meditation is where the rubber meets the road. The fourfold breath is useful as prep for meditation. Other breathing exercises? Not so much.

8) All of my books on the subject. ;-)

9) I don't follow any occult bloggers. I mostly read books by dead people, remember? Not many of them are blogging...

Banishing

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG and fellow readers,
Three weeks ago, I asked how to stop being disturbed at night by annoying spirit visitors. You wrote, "Banishings." I always used to go outside in the garden to do my SOP but started doing the banishing in the bedroom and from the very first night, we both slept much better. The last 3 weeks have been uniformly peaceful.
Thanks very much,
Maxine

Re: Banishing

[ecosophia]

You're welcome, and glad to hear it.

[(Anonymous)]

You might recall I asked you about developing a relationship with Beli, and that I had the very strange experience of having a string of attractive women invade my personal space. Not unpleasant, but odd. I can see why some Druids have developed sex clubs, but that’s really not for me, so I asked Beli how to properly use the energy that I’m picking up. This past week, a string of female co-workers that I rarely see stop me to talk shop. Also, I’ve turned into the person the warband of just-outa-high school boys ask when they actually need to know something. And I’m reading The Quest for Merlin, so the sound of one penny dropping accompanied my typing “warband.”
So… seems that Beli is helping me with my big stumbling block – people. I’m not sure what to make of all this, or if I should do anything besides keep burning incense and discussing matters with him as if he were sitting in the room with me…
Your advice on how to proceed is welcome.
Puce Jocular Aardvark

[ecosophia]

Do exactly what you're doing. It's obviously working.

[(Anonymous)]

Hello JMG,

1. I've just started Self-Initiation into the Golden Dawn Tradition by Chic & Tabatha Cicero, and early on, they introduce the so-called Vibratory Formula. I'm wondering whether all Words of Power should be vibrated or intoned using the Vibratory Formula? For reference, the VF is described as follows:

“The student should first imagine a glowing white Light above the head, and then visualize this Light descending to the level of the heart. The letters of the name to be vibrated should be imagined in white within the heart center. Then the name is slowly pronounced so that the sound vibrates throughout the chest cavity and is felt throughout the entire body. The student should imagine that the sound reaches into every corner of the universe.

2. Is it possible to become a successful magician and/or mystic without paying attention to dreams, performing dreamwork, keeping a dream journal, etc.?

3. Related to the above: what is the role of dreamwork in the context of the Western Inner Tradition? Did the ancient Hermeticists, Gnostics, Neoplatonists or Qabalists place any importance on it?

[ecosophia]

1) Experiment with using it, and then at other times simply vibrate the name without the visualizations. See what results you get, and draw your own conclusions.

2) Yes. Dreamwork is a specialization, not a general requirement.

3) It's not usually an important part of the work, but there are exceptions. Yeats used controlled dreaming in place of waking clairvoyance, for example. It's one of many options for getting into contact with the inner planes; it's never done much for me (I've recorded my dreams for years at a stretch and ended up no wiser than I began) but your mileage may vary.

[open_space]

Good evening JMG!

I've been thinking about how Levi says that at the heart of occultism there is Science. I can't but agree with him, for it seems to me that through occultism one seeks transcendence through knowledge just as a devout Christian seeks it through love. One thing I can't unpack however, since there are still many hooks of the omnipotence we are taught to believe as trained scientists (with a lower case s, of cóurse) and that is that there is something that gives the illusion of simplicity when explained. How can I avoid been arrogant with the matters of spirit and balance it with true knowledge instead of being proud about knowing?

[ecosophia]

You've just posed one of the questions that takes lifetimes to answer. Nor can I, or anyone else, tell you what the answer is -- each person must find it for himself or herself.

Flag designs

[(Anonymous)]

Following on from the discussion of the pride flag, are you able to briefly give your thoughts on a different flag?

(Hopefully you are unaware that) a few years ago the Prime Minister of New Zealand tried to change the national flag as a vanity project in an attempt to create a legacy for himself - thankfully he failed because the selected design was a terrible flag. As part of the public consultation process this flag (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Peak_flag) was one of the options. It never got a fair hearing as said Prime Minister rigged the process so nothing but his favoured design stood a chance.

However the reason I'm asking now is that the flag itself generated an interesting reaction from the public. It had quite broad support across a very wide range of our population, the only real common factor I can pick between them is that it was often fringe groups or those for who the existing politic systems isn't agreeable - even though such groups would typically be considered adversaries, even enemies - the flag was an interesting common ground.

I sometimes wonder when populist politics finally makes itself felt here in New Zealand if this flag might be the rallying point under which it rises. But I don't know why I think that, and I'm curious if there is something about the design that I'm unconsciously aware of.

(For reference NZ politics are consistently 5-7 years behind the other anglo nations, so I imagine populism will pop up here in the near future).

Re: Flag designs

[ecosophia]

That's a very interesting flag. Do I understand correctly that it's based on Maori design principles? In any case, it would be wise for people who like the flag to use it and fly it, since it has a strong energy; its symbolism isn't really clear to me, but then I don't know Maori visual art at all well.

Prayers

[lunarapprentice]

Hello JMG and all.

Today, my 17 year-old daughter Jenny, who is at summer camp, dislocated her left shoulder while swimming. This is the 20th dislocation in 4 years, and the fourth time in the last 2 months. She is in the ER now. I wasn’t able to be notified in a timely fashion because my phone was accidentally in ‘airplane mode’; so as I write, I’m cooling my heals while a family friend drives my ex down to pick her up. It tears me up that I’m not the one driving to get her.

This shoulder problem is obviously severe, and I’ve long feared my daughter will need a shoulder reconstruction, with subsequent permanent partial disability (she’s effectively such now), and chronic pain.

I understand the ER docs were not able to properly reduce her shoulder, and the CT looks to be a “real mess” (her mom couldn’t relay the findings to me). So she’ll need an MRI ASAP, which the ER can’t or won’t do. Tomorrow morning, I’ll be seeking an urgent appointment with her regular orthopedist.

Jenny is Jewish by birth and upbringing, but considers herself Christian. She has a daily prayer practice, and I think she would be accepting of prayers, certainly from those traditions. On Jenny’s behalf, I request prayers for her benefit from this commentariat so inclined. Please.

Thank you.

—Lunar Apprentice

Re: Prayers

[ecosophia]

Positive energy en route.

[mollari]

I realized a few days ago that when I vibrate, it's almost singing. I decided to run with it and actually make it into singing, and found it vastly more effective.

a) Do you know if anyone else does this?

b) Do you know if anyone has written anything on the link between singing and occult practice?

[ecosophia]

1) I knew a guy who had operatic voice training and sang the LBRP. It worked extremely well.

2) Not specifically, though there are plenty of books on the relation between occultism and music in general.

[(Anonymous)]

JMG,

Two questions from me this week, followed by a small update on the stuff I asked you about last week.

Questions:

1. I’ve been reading a ton of old MM’s lately, and something i’ve been wondering about is this: why is that trees thrive on the water that has all the toxic etheric crud that we scrub off with the hoodoo baths?

2. I’ll extend this one to the commentariat as well: do you know any historical figures or anyone at all who have had extremely clustered natal charts? I’m just learning astrology and I’m hitting a bit of a wall because of my, frankly, anomalous chart. I quite literally have seven planets all in the same sign and the same house, and I’m wondering if there’s any historical precedents I could look into to better understand my own.

Ramble:

I asked you about three things last week: visualization, feeling "off-axis" during my rituals, and length of the MP.

I took your advice and stopped worrying about the visualization so much, and have been concentrating more on holding all the elements of the rituals together, and I've had good results. For the directions, I put up sticky note emblems of the elements at the cardinal directions in my space like you suggested. I've had a definite improvement in feeling less disoriented, and I'm also far more aware of the dimensions of the circle I'm working in now. W/r/t the ritual length, your answer honestly shocked me a bit. I’ve been consciously trying to do my rituals quicker but without rushing. Lo and behold, it has had absolutely no negative impact. I’m pretty baffled with what I was doing with all the extra time I was taking before this.

All these came together for me on Wednesday this week, and I had what was probably the best practice I’ve had since I started last year. One of the first times it felt truly ‘magical’, if I can use the adjective, haha. But, as if right on schedule, the proverbial (or literal) Watcher has been absolutely kicking my ass since. No steps forward without a leap backward of course.

Hope you enjoyed your weekend.

Cheers,
Reid

PS. I’ve never felt much of a personal calling to Druidry, but after seeing you say somewhere that trees can understand us non-verbally, I had a very lovely experience saying hi to a tree for the first time.

[ecosophia]

1) For the same reason that trees thrive on the CO2 we breathe out, and we thrive on the oxygen they breathe out. Our castoff energy is their fertilizer.

2) I don't do much natal astrology so don't know specific examples, but that kind of stellium isn't unknown -- I know someone with 4 planets in one sign and house, for example. Anyone else?

Glad to hear your practices are doing well!

Dune affirmations

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG,

I recently saw (not on this forum) the “Litany against fear” from Frank Herbert’s Dune being recommended as a daily affirmation by a quite experienced occultist.

It goes: “I must not fear. Fear is the mind killer, the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. where the fear had gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”

I really like the Duniverse so was attracted to the idea but after pondering it this strikes me as simply terrible affirmation material!

My understanding is that the human sub-conscious finds it very difficult to grasp the negative. Thus affirmations should avoid using “not” (and indeed “nothing”?). Thus the first line of the litany would be absorbed as “I must….fear”!

Is my understanding correct or am I missing something?

Thanks

Re: Dune affirmations

[ecosophia]

Ironically, I know people who use it to good effect, probably because it's picked up so much momentum from fans of the books. Leave off the first two sentences, btw, and it's not at all bad.

Rock Collection

[goatgodschild]

Hello, Mr. Greer! It has been several weeks of cleaning and redecorating over here, which has ended up leading me to the following question:

At this time, I have a small collection of stones available for magical use. However, I am not sure if some of them have any ability to be used in magic, so I would like to know what is a good way to divine this. Ordinarily I would look up their significance in Budge, but I am not sure what the stones in question are, except reddish and smooth, with lines of white quartz.

Re: Rock Collection

[ecosophia]

Well, is there a system of divination you know fairly well?

Fortune update

[(Anonymous)]

John Michael,

I wrote to you last Monday asking if I was an ‘energy vampire’ or not. I just wanted to update you and say that I picked up two of the three Dion Fortune books you recommended. I did a quick read of the Esoteric Philosophy l over the weekend and found it incredibly interesting. I’m going to start a close reading of it along side the Sea Priestess this week. The Goat Foot God is a little out of my price range at the moment, but I’ll see what happens.

Thank you again.

(Feel free to not post this since it’s not a question, I won’t be offended)

Re: Fortune update

[ecosophia]

You're most welcome!

Wondering if there's any cause for concern...

[(Anonymous)]

Hello Mr. Greer,

I have been working my way through the SOP for the past 3 months, and have a question about the way that I am working with (I think) telluric energy. Solar energy is very intuitive to me and I can do all visualizations with it and get good results. Telluric energy didn't even show up for a while, and when it finally did, it feels like... glop... in my body. It's very easy to get it to the lower half but I have to force it up to the top of my head - it takes enough effort that my body shakes as I do. It's taken me some time to figure out how to combine such different energies for the sake of the ritual - I imagine the telluric energy dissolving like it's diluting in water, and then blast the solar energy right through it, and so far that's worked the best. It ends up feeling like I've done something very intense on the inside when all is said and done.

My question is, am I putting myself in any danger for anything kundalini related? Is this a possibility? If so, what would be the danger signs? I feel like I have natural limiters on solar energy and breathing exercises, but telluric energy feels so weird to me I get nervous. I'd appreciate any health advice or precautions you have to offer for working with this energy (or if this sounds like I've mistaken something else for telluric energy...)

Thank you very much for offering these Magic Mondays, I deeply appreciate them.

Best,
Megan

Re: Wondering if there's any cause for concern...

[ecosophia]

No, there's no cause for concern. Some people have a lot of trouble with one or the other current. You might try imagining the telluric energy diluting in spring water before it gets to you and bubbling up through your body -- that works well for some people.

Ogham themes in meditation

[(Anonymous)]

Dear Mr Greer,

Just a quick meditation progress report, and an unrelated question, if I may.

I feel like I might be starting to get the hang of using discursive meditations (a practice I’m still largely a beginner at) to unlock things, at least a bit. I’ve been considering the basic Ogham few definitions with a view to figuring out the elemental attributions.

1. Yesterday for example I meditated on Gort. I was having trouble with the basic idea of Fire of Water, or the “Fiery aspect of Water”; what on earth that could mean. It then occurred to me that when the sea becomes stormy it can batter away in a powerful, purposeful (willful, fiery) yet inefficient manner (Gort-like, indirect progress) such as in a coastline being gradually eaten away by surging waves.

I know there are no wrong answers in meditation, but does this seem like my brain is engaging the matter well enough or am I too easily satisfied….?

2. I imagine this might become a “fine theme for meditation” :-), but I wondered why in the DMH the Deity for Spirit Below is given as Ced rather than Ana? Going by the deity descriptions in that book, Ana is who I’d have assumed.

Many thanks

Re: Ogham themes in meditation

[ecosophia]

1) Good. Yes, that sounds like a good meditation.

2) Because that was what was in the material I received. If you feel it's appropriate you can invoke Ana instead.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm learning discursive meditation and the fourfold breath has caused an unusual problem. It's too effective at stopping thought. Once I've done it I can't start thinking again. I either can't think at all or sentances just trail off. In the first stage when I was just sitting there I could think fine. But now my mind seems to have got used to the non-thinking state and just turns off when I sit down to meditate, even without doing the fourfold breath. Even thoughts my brain was happily chewing over and were even slightly distracting during the SoP, just stop the moment I sit down. More disturbingly, anything I try to force myself to think about during meditation, I seem to lose enthusiasm for and don't want to think about even after meditation.

[ecosophia]

What's happening is that your subconscious is resisting your meditative practice. This is quite common. Push through it -- keep on practicing, force yourself to trudge through the thinking process, and look at the loss of enthusiasm with a skeptical eye; these difficulties don't last long unless you let them push you around.

[(Anonymous)]

Of all the things you can make talismans for, are there any that are recognised as unusually powerful? A possible example is a talisman for good timing. It's a single focus but one that would benefit multiple areas of your life. Do some have a higher return on investment than others?

[ecosophia]

It depends entirely on your natal chart. Those planets that are well dignified will be unusually powerful for you in matters concerning the house or houses that they rule.

Fasting and the Grail Ceremony

[(Anonymous)]

Hello!

(1) What is the function of fasting in occult practice?

(2) In january 2020, you mentioned that you were working on a book about the "Grail Ceremony and gnosticism". May we have an update?

(3) As a historian of ideas and of the occult, how do you source your primary materials? Is it via the net or do you spend a lot of time digging stuff in public libraries? I am asking that because I have a few writting projects and where I live public librairies really suck (and it's not the US!) and I have some difficulty in getting access to source material. Any hints?

Regards and many thanks.

Re: Fasting and the Grail Ceremony

[ecosophia]

1) It's a way of sensitizing the subtle bodies.

2) The book is almost finished and will be going to the publisher next month.

3) These days, I mostly use online archives. I've worked with university libraries at various times in the past.