ecosophia | Magic Monday

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Magic Monday

I'm going to be shocking and launch this week's Magic Monday a few minutes early, since I'm here on Dreamwidth,. (The picture is Thomas Taylor, the great Regency-era Platonist and worshiper of the Greek Gods, godfather of the modern Neopagan revival)

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, though it may be Tuesday sometime before I get to them all.

I've had several people ask about tipping me for answers here, and though I certainly don't require that I won't turn it down. You can use the button below to access my online tip jar.

~~With that said, have at it!~~

***This post is now closed to new questions. See you next week!***

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Hi Mr. Greer,

This is my first time commenting, but I have spent a great deal of time reading through a number of your books recently in order to begin discerning which system to consider as my first foray into magical practice! I very much enjoy your writing style and have found your work fascinating (especially as a graduate level theology and religion nerd haha)! I’m glad I found magic Monday’s a few days ago because I’ve had about a million questions I figured would be best addressed and answered by you. Thankful, you’ve made that a possibility!

I’ll begin with two questions this week:

1. I started rereading The Druid Magic Handbook earlier this evening. In the section on intentionality, you discuss the fact that many beginners struggle with proper intentionality and, for example, seek to use magic to gain wealth only to end up poorer. You say this is because their focus is often on wanting wealth when it ought to be on having wealth—focusing on wanting leads to their work bringing about a state of want rather than a state of possessing wealth.

As a beginner, I wondered if you had some suggestions about the kinds of questions you find most helpful to ask yourself when considering how to avoid inadvertent mistakes of focus/intentionality in magic work that could lead to these negative outcomes? Certainly one particular focus may appear to be helpful to the careless or inexperienced, but actually ends up begin harmful (as in the case of wanting vs. having wealth). How would the novice check themselves, so to speak, and (hopefully) avoid accidentally working against themselves?

2. I am trying to discern if I should begin and complete the course of study given in The Druidry Handbook and the Druid Magic Handbook (along with joining AODA) or jump right in with the Celtic Golden Dawn. As I have no formal magical experience, my understanding is purely conceptual (although, I suppose being a practitioner of Reiki counts as some experience, but it’s a very different kind of practice when contrasted with ceremonial magic of the druidical variety). When considering the two different systems, what are some of the most important differences in your mind between the two systems that you think could help a seeker like me think through that discernment process with greater wisdom?

Thanks again for making yourself available!

Gratefully,
David

1) The best thing you can do for this is to learn a system of divination and practice it regularly, so you get good at it. It's very difficult to work out a set of conscious questions that will cover the territory; on the other hand, it's fairly easy to do a divination asking, "Is this ritual intention something I should do?" and let the answer guide you.

2) The differences between the two systems are extensive, but they cover much the same ground in their different ways. Both require about the same investment of time and will yield comparable results. How should you decide between them? Read the books in question, imagine yourself doing the practices, and see which one feels right. It really does depend on the personal element, and on individual nonrational factors.

JMG,
Do you have any recommendations for books that tell the stories, the mythology, of the deities in the Welsh Driud tradition? In the Druid Magic Handbook you state that the books (or most of them) are out of print.
One book in the bibliography sounds promising, Mythology of the British Isles by Geoffrey Ashe. Does this book address the Welsh Druid deities, or can you recommend any others?
Thank you,
Yanocoches

There actually isn't much mythology, in the sense of narrative stories, about the Druid Revival deities. What scraps there are, you'll find in Lewis Spence's The Mysteries of Britain and Ross Nichols' The Book of Druidry, and in the books these two volumes reference. But the deities of the Druid Revival were traditionally understood more as living presences right now than as beings of whom stories were told from the past: Hu is present always in the sky, Hesus in every tree (and especially every oak), Ced in the soil, Niwalen in dawn and dusk, and so on.

Is it a common experience for beginners (of magic or a spiritual/religious practice) to be carried into said practice by a hopeful enthusiasm and then find nothing's really 'clicking'?

I'm thankfully not being hit with a corresponding resistance to doing my daily practices, but am a bit perplexed, for one thing, by my daily ogham reading having, consistently, no relevance to my days and by prayer still feeling like more of my usual unfocused mental chatter. I also admit to the meditation practice being a weak link - I'm practicing with the CosDoc reading, though maybe it would be better if I worked on something more basic and more connected to the DMH and the DH...anyway...

Is the sense that "I'm doing it wrong" a typical phase some folks just have to go through?

Do you recommend just keeping on doing what I'm doing (I'm guessing yes) even if I just feel like my same mediocre self bumbling about with no indication of any capacity for religious experience/connection ?

I suspect this question badly conceals an ego hope that 'I'm special and shortcuts exist for me' - :( sigh

No question, just the following incident to relate.

A few mornings ago, upon my groggy awakening, a family member did something to upset me. The provocation was considerable, but I overreacted and really blew my top. Being under-rested, I went back to bed and slept for a couple of hours longer, still simmering but also feeling badly about my overly harsh response.

While asleep I had a lucid dream. That is, at a certain point I realized I was dreaming and didn’t wake up. I became aware that I could do things at will in my dream.

Still dreaming, I performed the Tau Cross, similar to the cabalistic cross; I had the same struggle visualizing as I do when awake. I then exerted my will to fix a mechanical household issue connected with the source of my annoyance; it basically served as a metaphor, I think. It took me two tries to get it right. Then I appeared to my family member - or at any rate she appeared before me - and gave her a message. I addressed to her words of reassurance, that all was well. She looked at me and seemed to hear me, but appeared very pale, almost salt white, frowning and haggard, and seemed to have difficulty paying attention.

Shortly after this it became unfeasible to maintain the lucid dreaming state and I awoke. Within half an hour I learned that the person in question had been suffering considerable dental pain since the night before, requiring an emergency trip to the dentist that day.

Lately I’ve been wondering if magic would ever be any use to me, other than for injuring myself inadvertently. Now I’m inclined to think that I would likely not have been able to act in this dream as I did, were it not for several years of fairly regular magical practice. And I am convinced that the dream was quite real, and that the communication conveyed in it reached its intended audience.

Hi JMG,

You talk in Ecosophia this week about the lack of spiritual connection to place. I feel this very strongly. I'm still close to where I grew up, but my family isn't, and I'm in insecure rented accommodation and may have to move again at short notice and on someone else's timescale.

Cambridge, England. Sprawling urbanisation. Our closest current yuppie-flat development has this as the public art centrepiece:

http://www.trumpingtonlocalhistorygroup.org/sitebuilder/images/HobsonSquare_4835_0517-351x227.jpg

It's meant to reference Bronze Age postholes, but what it says to me is dead, burnt, twisted old-growth forest. The art-bollocks says "Hand scorched and rubbed down with wire brushes to produce its final finish, the sculpture is made from misshapen chestnut wood"; the wood was imported from Scandinavia. It's capitalist conquest of the natural world. If I was a spirit of place I'd have buggered off somewhere else or given up by now.

How do you reconnect with the local spirits when they've been erased by development? Are there still even spirits to engage with? Even the trees have all been individually deliberately planted within living memory, and they will each be removed and replaced by a different tree according to remote bureaucracy.

Also, local archetypes: we've got 800 years of hallowed history of academic abstraction. We're rational materialist central. We're liberal internationalist, with high rates of migration and immigration of people who are coming for the intellectual environment and the career development, and have been displacing people who are here because of place or family for generations now. We're as post-nation-state as you get anywhere, and about to get beached as the tide goes out. Before that there were Anglo-Saxons and Normans and Vikings and Romans and Celts.

How do you untangle archetypes of place from archetypes of population, when you're 800 years displaced from anyone who knew the archetypes of place? The land itself was different 800 years ago; it's drained fenland.

I think there's something very toxic and post-Empire underlying specifically-English politics, and Cambridge is somehow detached from it by not being specifically-English. I can't tell how to get any kind of a handle on it.

Also, I know you've moved again recently; do you find it uncomfortable and disorienting to leave one spiritual place environment permanently for another? Does it take adjustment? Do you choose where to live based on the spiritual or the physical?

Thank you,
Aldabra

Is there a best orientation to sleep in? I read somewhere sleeping with your head pointing north was best and I think it had something to do with energy flows.

When you get a new mop for natural magic floor washes, does that become your magic mop from then on, as long as you don't use it for mundane purposes, or do you need a new mop every time you do it?

I am reading several books that you have recommended in the past, one of them is Roger Ames' translation of the Dao De Jing. I know that Daoist cosmology is quite different than the cosmology in the system of magic that you practice, but I'm wondering how compatible the Dao De Jing is with magic (specifically that outlined in the Druid Magic Handbook)?

Dear JMG,

I presume rituals such as the LBRP or the SoP are best done first time in the morning but, Are they also suitable for practice immediately before going to sleep? If not, is there any practice (including meditation and divination)more suitable for this time?(whether to help with sleep, clear out the debris of the day or to propitiate meaningful dreams)

Many thanks!
Manuel

Good day Mr Greer,

A weekly chart (August, 12 thru 18) cast yesterday yielded a curious pattern of repetitions.
1st thru 4th Mothers are exactly the same as 1st thru 4th Daughters, respectively

Acquisitio, Laetitia, Tristitia, Amissio.

This led to:

1st Niece, 3rd Niece = Puer
2nd Niece , 4th Niece = Puella

Right witness , Left witness = Conjunctio
The judge is Populus

Index, Pars Fortunae = Puella (12th house)
Via Puncti stops at both witnesses.

I tend to think it’s going to be a dull week except for the fact I might try my luck at the lottery.
Do these repetitions carry any special meaning?
Could you add any insights?
Thank you.

Hi! I'm curious if the practices in "Self-Unfoldment by Disciplines of Realization" are compatible with the work in DMH. Based on what I've read about the former, it's not magical training per se, but I wondered if it would be a system that shouldn't be mixed while learning Druid magic.

As always, many thanks!

Hello, JMG.

1) I'm (still) looking for a system of energy healing to study alongside with DMH practices. So far I am leaning toward Reiki, but I am not sure if it is compatible. You mentioned you were working on a book about a Druid healing method. I'm also curious about that.

2) About FAQ pages. I suppose the easiest way to do it would be to create a post with a "FAQ" tag and refer anyone who asks about practicing magic around children to this post, which should be easily located by this tag.

3) About a Magic Monday Wiki. I'd prefer to see a book that doesn't require Internet or electricity to read. I'll start compiling materials from MMs and sort questions and answers into categories when I can.

Hello!

At what age do you think we can initiate kids to discursive meditation and how?

Thanks!

Hello

(1) What is the aura and its links to the etheric and astral plane?

(2) Can we perceive it?

(3) What does it tell us about the person?

Many thanks

JMG
Not so much a question - more a thank you.
Over on I think Kek 3 I asked about a reading source for Charles Stuart 1st (Britain) getting into occult practice. You had made the point about delusions of magical power distracting leaders from a reality building thus toward a disaster.
You recommended Vaughan Hart's 1994 Art and Magic in the Court of the Stuarts. I rapidly obtained at astonishingly low cost for UK a fine copy of this very interesting book having insights into a previous crux time in British history. And I knew nothing of Inigo Jones interest in Stonehenge. It has given me, however, a task. The book was purportedly ex libris and from a well known large online seller of used books but actually appears to have been out on loan from 2002. Am checking but have yet to hear back from the University concerned.

Caution (and ordinary ethics) in magic however low cost compared with the Stuart extraordinary extravagance?
best
Phil H

Is there a way to ask a yes/no question or a "choice between two options" type question with ogham divination? If so, how would one best do it?

Hi John Michael,

Mate, you've been busy over at Ecosophia this week and I have not wanted to pester you! I ask you the rhetorical question: How much can a Koala Bear? - without expecting an answer to that question of course, it is just me being amusing. :-)

A serious question for you though: Given the movement away from acknowledgement of place in Western culture, I sort of wonder whether the Reformation and Counter-Reformation and then the Age of Enlightenment, actually required that the concept of place be removed in order for us to accept a certain sort of mechanicistic view of the world. That sort of mechanical view of the world seems to be rather prevalent today and the constructions of out culture thrive on it, but I don't really know for sure and am just speculating and playing around with the idea. What do you reckon about that?

Chris

Something occurred to me recently that is surely not a thought completely original to me, and I'm curious about your perspective on it.

I was looking at a pair of Komainu, the animal guardian statues that watch from either side in front of Shinto shrines. Generally speaking, one is male, and one is female; one has its mouth open (in a pose called "a-gyou", which literally means "ah" form) and the other with its mouth closed (called "un-gyou", which means "un" form). The symbolism attributed to this is usually something along the lines of expressing the beginnings and endings of all things; in any case it's pretty clearly a yin-yang type of pairing. The vowel pair makes "a-un" and derives from the Hindu mystic sound "Aum", which in modern times usually comes in the form of "Om". As this is the natural combination of sounds one gets by opening their mouth its widest, and closing their mouth but still vocalising until the sound disappears, it's a logical aural expression of the concept of beginning and end.

Interestingly, Aum is not just the two parts of "Ah-um" as expressed by the two Komainu (or for that matter one of my favorite albums, the seminal Charles Mingus album, "Mingus Ah Um"); rather it is considered to be three syllables, with the "u" sound representing a midpoint between "a" and "m", where the mouth is neither fully closed nor fully open. Here is one of a few examples of a trisyllable explication given on the "Om" Wikipedia page: "The Aitareya Brahmana of Rig Veda, in section 5.32, for example suggests that the three phonetic components of Om (pronounced AUM) correspond to the three stages of cosmic creation, and when it is read or said, it celebrates the creative powers of the universe."

This all sounds rather similar to another mystic syllable which you are intimately familiar with via the Druid Revival traditions. AUM, when broken discretely into its three syllables, is pronounced as "Ah-oo-m". Notated in Japanese, this is written with the three characters 「あうん」. AWEN, when broken discretely into its three equal parts, is pronounced as "Ah-oo-en". Notated in Japanese, this would be written with... exactly the same three characters, 「あうん」. Not similar-- exactly the same. Now, this is due to a phonetic peculiarity of Japanese where all words with an ending sound of "n", "ng", "m" have been ironed out into the same character 「ん」, and which is generally pronounced like "m" with the mouth closed.

Certainly neither AUM nor AWEN come from Japanese, but I think it's pretty extraordinary that if you ever translated Druid Revival texts into Japanese, you would need to at least include a footnote explaining to Japanese people that despite it being spelled exactly the same way, it is in fact a *different* mystical power word from the one they already know, which *also* happens to express the creative forces of the cosmos in three parts...

And it makes me wonder if long ago, AWEN might not have been pronounced with a closed-mouth "m" sound at the end, and through phonetic drift in a reverse fashion to Japanese, came to be pronounced with an "n". This is all completely unscholarly speculation, of course.

What do you know of the history of the word AWEN? It predates Iolo Morganwg, does it not? Is it a case of convergent evolution? Cultural exchange lost in the mists of time? Simultaneous expression of a universal truth, at least as it is filtered through human vocal anatomy? Do you have any opinions on the matter, and is this a topic that to your knowledge has ever been explored in any meaningful way?

Hi there John Michael,

I have a few questions:
1. Is there a good way to include family (wife and kids) in the Druid celebrations throughout the year? I have not done any on my own yet, but I am wondering if doing it as a family makes sense.
2. If you only had 10 to 15 minutes each day for meditation type work, how would you approach it? I understand that 30 minutes per day is the preferred amount, but I'm trying to figure out if the lower amount is worth working with at all.
3. Is there a set of Ogham cards that is different than the others or will any found on amazon work just as well?

Many thanks as always,
Matt

Hi JMG, this is Bogatyr,

Introducing your Kek series, you said that (paraphrasing) magic is what the excluded turn to when they have no other ways to influence the system. I was expecting you to describe how the Chans had achieved something concrete by doing this, but you went in quite another direction. That’s left me scratching my head. What examples have there been when magic successfully tipped the balance?

In England, as you pointed out, Charles I’s magic didn’t help him; the Commonwealth was established using muskets, swords, and pikes.

In Russia, the Tsarist court, and the middle classes of Russia at the time of the revolution, were awash with occultists of all kinds, and they completely failed to save their system. Revolution by means of rifles (plus the Cruiser Aurora) triumphed.

In China, the Taiping mystics, and their successors, the Boxers, both failed to use their magical systems to overthrow the Manchu. Western rifles, cannon, and Maxim guns preserved the Imperial system. Both Sun Yat-sen and Mao Zedong used firearms to achieve change.

In South Africa, Nongqawuse’s prophecies led the Xhosa to catastrophe. Later, Umkhonto We Sizwe used Ak-47s to much greater effect.

In other words, I can’t think of an example where the excluded have successfully used magic to overthrow the power system that oppressed them. Success in either direction generally comes - if you’ll pardon the phrase - from the barrel of a gun.

I can only think of two successful uses of magic as a policy tool.

The first is Dion Fortune, et al, mobilising magic to defend the realm against Nazism.

The second - and I believe this was discussed back at TADR - was when the US Establishment after WW2, seeking to avoid the kind ofl leftward swing that returning servicemen were driving in the UK, used occult methods to focus the workers’ attention on consumerism instead. (Correct me if I’m wrong; my memory may be at fault, but I believe that was the gist of it).

Thus, magic has only been used successfully to protect the status quo, not to change it. What examples are there that I don’t know about it, where the magic of the excluded has changed things?

Do the collective images such a Mickey Mouse, Ronald McDonald, Superman, Batman, etc have any sort consciousness?

Nando

Hello, JM

Thanks again for providing this forum and your time and attention.

I have a couple of questions relating to the Druid Magic Handbook practices.

I've been performing the SoP consistently since January and am fairly comfortable with it. I plan to start the Grove material soon, maybe beginning around the Equinox.

I use the suggested Irish pantheon (I'm irish, and while I like the Welsh I have less affinity with their language). I wanted your advice about changing out Bríd, for Áine, either in the Elemental Cross portion, or during the Calling of the Elements. She has been described as goddess of summer, and the sun, and I feel she could add something to the pantheon - the other thing that prompted this is seeing the Legananny Dolmen, named for her - the tripod like structure seemed analogous with the 3 legs of the cauldron.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legananny_Dolmen

Assuming this type of change is ok, does it require me to go back to basics and get comfortable with her in the SoP, and are there other steps to take - I've assumed a divination or two, and some meditation also.

Many thanks,

I'm interested in indoor farming technologies like PlantLab - https://www.plantlab.nl/, also known as 'disco farming' because of the coloured lights. :) They use a lot of electricity but only tiny amounts of water and nutrients, and no pesticides, herbicides or fuel for agricultural equipment. They're basically machines for turning electricity into food, and as long as power can be supplied they cut sun, rain and soil out of the deal and produce food year round. I'm in two minds about it as on one hand there is the considerable electricity consumption, but on the other they can produce vast quantities of food without the environmental damage industrial farming does. Indoor farming can done in cities - located in shipping containers, buildings, and even underground to make the most of otherwise underused space, so it doesn't impinge on the landscape. It also grows the food close to the demand and cuts the energy and cost of transport.

My question is - what spiritual qualities would food grown in those conditions have?

Thank you for always giving your time and energy to teach in this way.

In Magic Monday two weeks ago, when asked to expound a bit on the conflicting requirements and results of ritual magic and psychedelics as a spiritual path, you wrote (https://ecosophia.dreamwidth.org/29000.html?thread=1613896#cmt1613896): "Magic is the art and science of causing change in consciousness in accordance with will. It works by developing conscious control over states of mind, and when you interact with what (for present purposes) we'll call the unconscious mind, you do it in a deliberate fashion, in which the conscious mind is never submerged. Clarity of mind, strength of will, self-knowledge, and self-mastery are essentials of the path of magic.

The psychedelic path, by contrast, requires you to be ready to give up control over your states of consciousness. While you're working with a psychedelic ally, the ally is in control, and it's only afterwards that you reintegrate your experiences with your conscious experience of the world. Clarity of mind and strength of will aren't useful in that work; it requires a receptive approach rather than an active one. (In this way it's rather similar to mysticism.)"

While, with effort, I can think of a very few activities which require purely an active or passive approach (Tug Of War, say, which requires pulling but no pushing; or the extreme passivity required to remain still as a doctor performs necessary and delicate surgery on you in a situation where anasthetic is unavailable), for the most part any complex action is necessarily a combination of alternating activity and passivity. A martial artist who always punches and kicks but never dodges or blocks will not get very far; likewise one who always dodges and blocks but never punches or kicks. And a conversationalist who only talks and never listens-- or only listens and never talks-- is not holding a conversation at all. You also made the analogy of not being able to go North and South at the same time. While this is true, don't most people sometimes wish to go North, and sometimes South?

Is not the path of ritual magic also filled with passivity balancing the activity? For example, discursive meditation may be active but it requires stillness to be able to think with clarity-- and it is often unclear whether the profoundest thoughts come from inside or out. And it may be active to ask the gods to help to balance you, but it is passive to actually be worked on. How is consulting divination to determine the best course of action meaningfully different, in terms of activity and passivity, from consulting a psychedelic ally, of whom you can also ask questions and receive cryptic but enlightening answers? This train of thought extends even to the very motivations for doing magic. In the introduction to the Cosmic Doctrine, Dion Fortune suggests that if one can answer the riddle "Why do you want to study occult science?" correctly, they possess the key to unlock the Gate. If I understand her correctly, her answer seems to be "I long to know in order to serve". And is not serving others a perfect balance of active and passive? One subsumes selfish desires in order to serve; but there is still leeway in most situations to make one's own choices about the best ways to serve.

Or perhaps I am not understanding something about what you mean exactly by an active path and a passive path. For now, I think I will boil this down to two questions.

(1) Is Ritual Magic necessarily active, and psychedelic spiritualism necessarily passive?

(2) Assuming for now that they are those things. What is the utility in focussing one's efforts so fully on activity or passivity?

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

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Magic Monday

Regarding intetionlity

Re: Regarding intetionlity

Welsh deity mythology

Re: Welsh deity mythology

no subject

Magic in a Lucid Dream

no subject

no subject

no subject

Night-time practice

Geomancy

no subject

no subject

Meditation for kids

Aura

no subject

Ogham question

Mechanical oblivion

Awen and Aum

Mish Mosh of Questions

Magical successes?

Mind forms

no subject

no subject

Passive and Active Paths